Cibrarjp  of  tire  t1\eolo0ical  ^emmarjp 

PRINCETON  • NEW  JERSEY 
PRESENTED  BY 

Delavan  L,  Pierson 

V572.I 
.1  4S 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2016 


https://archive.org/details/chineseOOthom 


THE  CHINESE 


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A <rc'm  of  C'liincst'  arcliilccliirc : Loong  W all  tcni])lo.  Tang  Period, 

700  A.l). 


'*3  , 


THE  CHINESE 


By 

JOHN  STUART  "THOMSON 


ILLUSTRATED  FROM  PHOTOGRAPHS 


"One  seeing,  however,  is  better  than 
a thousand  people  telling  you  of  it” 
— Chintje  Proverb. 


INDIANAPOLIS 

THE  BOBBS-MERRILL  COMPANY 
PUBLISHERS 


Copyright  1909 
The  Bobbs-Merrili.  Company 

October 


PRESS  OF 

BRAUNWORTH  4 CO. 
BOOKBINDERS  AND  PRINTERS 
BROOKLYN,  N.  Y. 


TO 

L.  M.  S. 


\ 


CONTENTS 


CBAPTIK 

I Daily  Life  of  Foreigners  in  China  . 

II  The  Portuguese  and  Camoens  in  China  . 

III  Incidents  of  Daily  Life  Among  the  Chinese  . 

IV  Chinese  Humor 

V  China,  Political  and  Picturesque 

VI  Chinese  Art  and  Literature  . . . . 

VII  Modern  Commerce  and  Business  in  China 
VIII  Climate  and  Diseases  of  South  China 
IX  Chinese  Religion  and  Superstition 
X Japan’s  Commercial  Example  to  China 
XI  The  Mirror  of  the  Past 


PAGB 
. I 

• 75 

. 97 

• 173 

. 186 
. 248 
. 290 
. 326 

• 363 

• 387 
. 417 


THE  CHINESE 


THE  CHINESE 


I 

DAILY  LIFE  OF  FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 

The  feeling  of  exile,  ever  too  melancholy  in  the  heart 
of  the  white  stranger  whose  lot  is  cast  in  this  southern 
land  of  ten  thousand  granite  peaks  which  extend  along 
the  coast  for  two  days  of  the  sea  journey  from  Shanghai, 
is  nowhere  more  happily  dispelled  for  a season  than  at 
Hong-Kong  Island  during  the  “ race  week  ” in  Feb- 
ruary. The  indispensable  Celestial,  Ah  Chow,  arrives 
from  the  breeding  camps  in  Mongolia  with  a motley- 
colored  string  of  shaggy,  hardy  Chinese  ponies,  thirteen 
hands  high,  for  which  he  paid  at  the  breeding  steppes 
only  ten  dollars  each,  but  which  he  will  sell  at  ten  times 
that  price.  They  are  all  of  such  uncertain  temper  that 
bets  are  laid  as  to  whether  they  will  be  left  at  the  post  or 
run  away  before  the  starter  has  shouted,  “ Go.”  Fat- 
bellied  as  they  are,  some  do  the  mile  in  two  minutes  ten 
seconds.  There  was  a day  in  China  in  the  reign  of 
Hiao,  when  the  Superintendent  of  the  Stud  ranked  next 
in  importance  to  the  Throne  itself.  Then  horses  were 
large  enough  to  bear  armored  men  to  battle.  The  his- 
tory of  stock  in  Japan,  as  well,  since  that  time  has  been 
one  of  decadence.  These  ponies  are  drawn  by  lot  by 
the  staffs  of  the  Scotch  firms,  English  officers  and  gentle- 
men, and  the  Parsee  bankers  who  deal  in  opium  and  land. 

I 


2 


THE  CHINESE 


Native  mafoos  (the  same  word  you  meet  in  Korea  as 
mapus),  or  jockeys,  are  hired,  and  you  will  notice  that 
they  mount  from  the  right  side.  Betting  booths  for  the 
slow-going  paris-mutuels,  where  the  book-makers  have  no 
chance  to  manipulate  odds,  are  erected.  In  this  French 
form  of  betting  each  investor  puts  an  equal  amount  into 
the  pool  and  those  who  have  named  the  winning  horse 
share  the  pool  money,  less  eight  per  cent,  for  expenses. 
The  anjemic  European  ladies  do  what  the  Chinese  women 
do,  and  paint  their  weather-melted  faces.  But  they  do 
what  the  Chinese  do  not,  that  is,  don  chiffon  and  lace, 
which  all  too  soon  is  sorry  and  soggy  in  a dripping,  moldy 
climate.  But  what  better  portrays  the  spirit  of  Empire 
than  this  very  indomitableness  of  these  English  women  — 
this  determination  to  have  an  Ascot  of  fashion  at  least 
once  a year  even  under  humid  tropic  suns,  or  drizzly  gray 
skies  and  mist-wrapped  peaks,  on  this  one  level  spot  of  the 
island,  a filled-in  swamp  called  Wong  Nei  Chong  at  the 
foot  of  the  exiles’  blue-walled  “ Happy  Valley  ” cemetery  ? 
Not  only  are  China  ponies  run  on  three  days  of  the  meet, 
but  enough  Walers  of  thirteen  and  one-half  hands,  Arabs, 
India  “ country  breds,”  and  stray  Americans,  are  gath- 
ered together  for  a fourth  day’s  racing.  Frequent 
gymkhanas  are  held,  even  through  the  hottest  spell,  when 
the  Polo  Club  members  ride  in  tent-pegging,  hurdle, 
obstacle  and  nomination  races,  and  such  other  horsey 
excitement  as  shall  keep  ladies  from  ennui  and  young 
gentlemen  in  debt  to  their  shroffs,  in  a climate  which  does 
not  foster  the  memory.  The  most  unique  of  all,  cer- 
tainly to  the  Chinese  onlooker  who  is  making  notes  for  a 
book,  are  the  ’rickisha  races,  where  the  Ku-niangs 
(ladies)  wave  their  motley-colored  Parisian  parasols  — it 
would  be  impossible  to  hold  at  arm’s  length  a Chinese 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


3 


bamboo  parasol  — to  urge  their  human  steeds  (not  native 
coolies  this  time,  but  English  gentlemen)  to  win.  The 
English  gentlemen  jockies  go  to  the  post  in  the  hard  sun, 
with  wet  bamboo  or  plantain  leaves  packed  under  their 
helmets,  but  they  are  game  enough  (as  the  world  may 
always  expect  of  our  European  Ulysses)  to  throw  these 
away  as  the  race  reaches  the  keen  stretch.  As  the 
Jockey  Club  of  Bombay  permits  the  women  from  Grant 
Road  to  attend  unescorted,  so  the  Hong-Kong  Jockey 
Clubs  permits  the  denizens  of  Lyndhurst  Terrace  to 
watch  the  scene  from  a remote  corner  of  the  stands.  It 
would  not  be  that  “ East  of  Suez  ” if  exclusiveness  had 
not  its  startling  inconsistencies.  At  Peking,  the  foreign- 
ers do  not  adjourn  to  the  famous  old  course  outside  the 
northwest  gate,  beneath  the  Taoist  and  Buddhist  temples, 
until  ^lay. 

They  tell  tales  that  at  Mirs  Bay  and  other  practice 
waters,  the  mess  of  the  war-ship  lands,  sets  cups  into  the 
Chinese  hills  and  tees  off  the  first  horseshoe  gravestone 
for  an  impromptu  game  of  golf.  I know  the  courses 
which  are  laid  among  the  native  graves  outside  the  Porta 
Cerco  of  Portuguese  Macao,  in  the  Heungshan  district  of 
China,  and  at  Ichang  are  not  much  improved  on  this. 
Hong-Kong  boasts  of  two  courses.  That  at  Wong  Nei 
Chong  is  level,  over  a race-track  twice,  one  swamp,  and 
made  bunkers.  Pulling  the  stroke  is  costly,  because 
most  of  the  greens  lie  parallel  with  the  track  and  ditch, 
which  penalize  the  player  if  driven  into.  The  other 
course  at  Deep  Bay  on  the  south  side  of  the  island  is 
reached  by  climbing  over  four  miles  of  hills,  or  by  a 
launch  sail  of  nine  miles.  The  wooded  hills  are  lofty,  and 
the  joy  of  contemplating  that  you  are  playing  in  view  of 
the  combing  surf  of  the  limitless  Pacific  is  sublime.  You 


4 


THE  CHINESE 


land  from  your  launch  by  native  sampans  and  play  around 
the  edge  of  a narrow  valley.  The  fifth  tee  is  in  the  neck 
of  a gorge  and  the  chaparral  to  each  side,  and  the  rocky 
stream  at  your  feet,  are  not  St.  Andrew’s  classic  com- 
forts, Put  away  your  brassey  and  even  your  driver,  for 
that’s  no  brawling  burn  before  you.  It  is  iron  work;  be 
steady,  satisfied  with  the  tight,  short  gains  of  infantry 
in  face  of  fire.  One  foot  off  the  course  is  to  be  enfiladed, 
and  put  hors  de  combat.  The  nerve  that  is  needed;  the 
thrill  when  it  is  all  over!  Again,  there  was  that  tree 
which  you  learned  to  loft  rather  than  play  past  it  with 
a cleek.  On  these  two  sides  men  who  for  many  a year 
in  battle’s  din  and  travel’s  mire,  have  ever  been  as  David 
and  Jonathan,  shall  be  arrayed  in  unsettled  argument 
for  ever,  in  a Service  Club  on  Pall  Mall  or  in  a library 
at  Annapolis. 

Here,  too,  is  classic  English  law  punishing  by  the 
astonishing  method  in  these  days,  of  sentence  to  the 
stocks.  There  must  be  the  trappings  of  awe  accompanying 
the  means  of  punishment  where  only  two  thousand  Eng- 
lishmen rule  three  hundred  thousand  Chinese,  all  crowded 
on  the  north  sloping  beach  of  the  island,  or  on  the  ten 
thousand  sampans  in  the  harbor.  There  has  not  been  a 
riot  among  the  natives  since  the  memorable  one  of  Oc- 
tober 3rd,  1884.  Beside  Victoria  the  Good’s  statue,  a 
red-turbanned  Sikh  policeman  stands  over  Kong  Sing, 
who  sits  on  the  powdered  disintegrated  granite  road,  with 
his  feet  imprisoned  in  boards,  all  because  of  a vaga- 
bondish  habit  of  greasing  his  queue  and  looking  covet- 
ously at  foreign  gentlemen’s  watch  chains.  No  fewer 
than  seventeen  hundred  undesirables  were  banished  by 
the  Hong-Kong  courts  last  year.  Sometimes  Chinese 
mandarins  come  to  the  Colony  and  their  victims  follow 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


5 


them  to  lodge  complaint  in  a British  court.  Juries  con- 
sist of  seven  men,  because  of  the  scarcity  of  Europeans 
serviceable.  In  Singapore,  natives  are  mixed  with  the 
Europeans  to  bring  the  jury  up  to  twelve.  A nefarious 
but  amusing  trick  of  the  light-fingered  natives  who  oper- 
ate on  the  crowded  steamer  wharves,  is  to  expectorate 
on  their  victim’s  left  shoulder  and  then  call  his  attention 
to  it.  While  he  excitedly  removes  the  heathen  affront, 
the  rascal,  whose  ways  are  saffron,  quickly  goes  through 
the  victim’s  right  pocket.  Natives  imprisoned  on  grave 
charges  have  to  submit  to  their  queues  being  cut,  as  for- 
merly many  excited  prisoners  hung  themselves  thereby 
in  their  cells. 

Hong-Kong’s  bustling  port  is  peculiar  in  that  there 
are  no  wharves.  Moreover,  the  anchorage,  instead  of 
being  well  spread  out  from  Causeway  Bay  to  Kennedy- 
town,  is  all  crowded  before  the  center  of  Victoriatown. 
Every  piece  of  freight  is  lightered,  and  every  passenger 
is  ferried.  British  Hong-Kong  is  really  Chinese  Can- 
ton’s seaport.  Two  million  passengers  pass  between  the 
two  ports  annually. 

The  picture  of  her  tonnage  can  perhaps  best  be  quickly 
drawn  by  comparative  figures;  London  thirteen  million 
tons;  Hong-Kong  twelve  million;  New  York  eleven  mil- 
lion tons  annually.  Hong-Kong’s  growth  to  be  the  sec- 
ond port  in  the  world  is  in  some  quarters  credited  to  the 
fact  that  she  imposes  only  one  charge  on  shipping,  viz. : 
the  insignificant  Lighthouse  tax  of  one  cent  Mexican  sil- 
ver a ton;  but  Manila,  which  imposes  no  tonnage  taxes, 
remains  stagnant  at  a small  tonnage.  Shanghai,  which 
imposes  the  highest  tax  in  the  Orient  of  twenty-nine  cents 
a ton,  continues  to  enjoy  a large  share  of  shipping. 
Yokohama  imposes  seven  and  one-half  cents  a ton. 


6 


THE  CHINESE 


Hong-Kong  rejoiced  at  the  close  of  1906  to  find  herself 
drawn  twenty  days  nearer  Europe  by  the  new  service,  un- 
der one  management,  of  thirty  days  from  Hong-Kong  to 
Liverpool  via  Vancouver  and  Quebec,  and  the  Colony 
expects  to  throw  off  her  alienation  in  the  host  of  travelers 
who  will  visit  the  port  and  enter  China  through  the 
southern  gateway,  to  which  she  is  the  key.  The  rateable 
values  of  the  city  of  Victoria  have  reached  six  millions, 
nearly  half  of  which  is  invested  in  the  precipitous 
“ Peak  ” district  above  the  clouds.  On  the  mainland 
at  Kowloon,  where  the  railway  to  Canton  is  rapidly 
raising  values  and  where  the  future  of  the  Colony  will 
lie,  rateables  have  reached  two  millions.  Great  as  is 
Hong-Kong’s  position  in  shipping  and  which  is  assailable 
by  China  at  Whompoa,  her  leadership  will  remain  in 
banking,  headed  by  the  noted  Hong-Kong  and  Shanghai 
Banking  Corporation,  which  is  now  financing  nearly  all 
China’s  great  developments  in  railways,  mines  and  in- 
dustrials. If  England,  through  this  bank,  would  only 
give  one-fortieth  of  the  attention  to  China  that  she  has 
given  in  the  past  to  Japan,  the  harvest  would  be  the  more 
potential,  even  as  the  high  millet  of  the  former’s  fields 
overtops  the  rice  fields  of  the  latter.  Hong-Kong  and 
Shanghai  bank-notes  are  the  only  paper  issues  accepted 
in  the  country  back  of  the  treaty  ports.  The  name  most 
prominent  with  the  Chinese  in  the  history  of  the  bank  is 
that  of  Sir  Thomas  Jackson,  a tall  Irishman,  whose  motto, 
writ  large,  was:  “Never  break  your  word  with  a 

Chinese,  for  he’ll  never  break  his  with  you.” 

It  is  believed  that  the  Hong-Kong  government  and  this 
bank  participated  in  the  loans  for  the  Chinese  Trunk  Rail- 
way line,  on  the  stipulation  that  China  would  assist  in 
connecting  Hong-Kong  and  Canton  by  rail,  and  thus  side- 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


7 


track  Whompoa  for  the  present.  This  railway  of 
eighty  miles,  trestlecl  across  swampy  country,  will  end  at 
Kowloon,  the  British  settlement  on  the  mainland,  from 
which  Hong-Kong  Island  lies  one  mile  distant.  With 
railways  coming  through  from  Calcutta,  Mandalay,  Bang- 
kok and  Hanoi,  centering  at  Yunnan,  and  thence  turning 
to  Canton,  and  with  rails  from  Han-kau  and  Amoy, 
Hong-Kong  is  dreaming  of  the  time  when  she  may  be 
the  largest  trans-shipping  port  in  the  world.  Land  is  at 
steeple  prices,  and  living  more  costly  than  in  New  York 
City.  Tenure  is  based  on  crown  rentals,  the  same  as  the 
Chinese  system. 

This  wonderful  island,  which  is  distant  seven  thousand 
miles  from  San  Francisco,  supplies  the  Pacific  coast  of 
America  with  half  of  its  refined  sugar.  The  raw  mate- 
rial comes  principally  from  Java,  but  also  from  the  Phil- 
ippines and  Chinese  Swatow.  The  largest  cane  refinery 
in  the  world  is  the  noted  Taikoo  at  Quarry  Bay, 
owned  by  Butterfield  and  Swire.  There  is  also  the 
China  Sugar  Refinery  at  Wong  Nei  Chong,  owned  by  the 
historic  house  of  Jardine,  Matheson  and  Company. 
Chinese  labor  refines  two  hundred  thousand  tons  a year 
at  three  and  one-half  cents  a pound.  The  coal  is  brought 
from  Moji,  Japan.  It  will  before  long  come  over  the 
Han-kau-Canton  Railway  from  Fa- Yuen  and  elsewhere 
in  the  heart  of  plethoric  China.  Up  to  the  present  these 
two  refineries  have  supplied  China  and  Japan.  Japan  has 
now  put  up  a tariff  wall  of  six-tenths  cent  a pound,  and 
is  manufacturing  her  own  sugar.  She  subsidizes  steam- 
ers to  bring  the  raw  product,  and  threatens  to  subsidize 
ships  to  carry  the  manufactured  article  to  China.  Hong- 
Kong,  with  cheap  labor  and  a nearer  location  to  the  raw 
product,  is  holding  the  fort  so  far  against  subsidy,  and 


8 


THE  CHINESE 


is  supplying  China.  For  po-po  or  sweetmeat-making, 
however,  the  Chinese  prefer  their  own  hand-refined 
Swatow  sugar,  which  goes  half  as  far  again  as  the 
cheaper  imported  brands. 

The  Taikoo  refinery  is  a marvelous  study  in  Scotch 
sociology\  There  is  a Company  reservoir  and  hospital  in 
the  hills;  a cable  to  carry  the  European  overseers  five 
hundred  feet  over  the  gullies  to  the  fever-free  Company 
bungalows  on  the  cliffs ; Company  model  tenements  at  in- 
expensive rents;  a Company  loan  fund  for  overseers  to 
bring  out  Scotch  wives;  running  track;  athletic  associ- 
ations, medals  and  baths;  launches  for  picnics,  and  a 
seven-hundred-foot  graving-dock  and  repair  yard  for 
Company  ships.  Employees  are  encouraged  to  join 
yacht,  golf,  water  polo,  gunning,  cricket  and  riding  clubs, 
so  as  to  be  athletically  happy  even  in  enervating  South 
China.  You  will  notice  that  nothing  indoors,  such  as 
billiards,  has  been  provided.  One  looks  in  vain  for  the 
great  American  firms  of  forty  years  ago.  Russell  and 
Company,  of  clipper-ship  fame,  as  well  as  the  Heard, 
Oliphant,  Bull  and  Archer  hongs,  have  ceased  to  exist, 
and  the  historic  hong  of  Dent  and  Company,  at  Macao, 
has  shrunk  to  an  unpretentious  and  seldom-visited  build- 
ing, hid  behind  an  ancient  wall.  Kee  Chung,  the  old 
princely  house  with  its  tropical  garden,  where  Russell  and 
Company  once  entertained  Secretary  W.  H.  Seward,  is 
one  of  the  show  places  of  Wanchai,  an  eastern  part  of 
Hong-Kong,  now  overrun  with  Chinese  coal-carriers. 

The  disintegrating  granite  peaks  of  Hong-Kong  may 
some  day  furnish  ping  tu  or  porcelain  powder  as  good 
as  that  of  the  Kiang-si  Hills.  Cement  works  have  al- 
ready raised  their  chimneys  over  the  famous  land-locked 
Kowloon  Bay,  where  Admiral  Keppel  won  Hong-Kong. 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


9 


An  Englishman  (few  as  there  are  in  the  East  as  com- 
pared with  the  Scotch),  brings  all  his  sporting  and  club 
impedimenta  to  the  Orient.  In  a little  vale  at  Hong- 
Kong,  between  Mts.  Kellett  and  Gough,  sixteen  hundred 
feet  above  the  water,  they  have  placed  a bungalow  club, 
which  has  a marvelous  view  of  peaks,  seas  and  land- 
locked bays.  There  is  nothing  like  this  view  at  those 
other  famous  oriental  mountain  retreats  from  the  heat, 
such  as  Simla,  Darjeeling  and  Namhan.  The  luxurious 
and  hospitable  Hong-Kong  Club,  where  I had  the 
pleasure  of  staying  for  a year  and  a half,  would  be  hard 
to  surpass  on  Fifth  Avenue  or  Pall  Mall  for  accommoda- 
tions and  appearance.  It  is  situated  on  the  Praya  Grande 
Central,  in  the  heart  of  Victoria  City  and  at  the  bay’s 
edge.  The  Emperor  of  China  could  not  be  made  a mem- 
ber on  account  of  his  color,  but  I have  heard  of  one 
Parsee  getting  in  through  the  eye  of  a needle,  and  it 
was  said  the  needle  was  threaded  by  the  English  king. 
There  will,  however,  never  be  another  such  contretemps. 
The  question  of  eligibility  for  this  club  is  about  the  hot- 
test question  in  Hong-Kong.  Imperial  politics  and 
nearer  wonders  are  taken  as  a matter  of  course  in 
comparison,  by  these  widely  traveled  Hong-Kongites, 
To  be  sent  into  Coventry  by  the  membership  com- 
mittee is  a quietus  on  the  most  persistent  aspirations, 
in  a colony  where  life  is  in  the  balance  between 
great  social  happiness  and  keen  social  misery,  made 
the  more  poignant  by  the  feeling  that  you  are  so 
remote  from  home  that  you  could  not  go  farther 
on  this  globe  without  getting  nearer.  Porcelain  baths; 
electric  fans;  Amoy  oysters  in  season;  mango  ice- 
cream; curries  made  opiate  with  powdered  poppy  seeds, 
and  the  noblest  wines  of  Europe,  minus  export  reduc- 


lO 


THE  CHINESE 


tions,  but  plus  a little  salicylic  acid,  are  certainly  luxu- 
ries, to  which  a bouquet  is  added  because  it  is  all  enjoyed 
in  the  alien  and  uncomfortable  tropics,  where  miseries 
and  privations  are  supposed  to  reign.  The  Japanese  add 
their  most  famous  brand  of  beer,  which  they  humorously 
call  Peace,  and  which  name  was  suggested  by  their 
richest  magnate,  Baron  Mitsui.  Perhaps  the  cuisine  has 
its  wearinesses  in  the  endless  repetition  of  stewed  cucum- 
bers, sickly  petsai,  and  tough  fried  brinjals,  but  never  a 
mortal  tasted  a richer  dish  than  vegetable  marrow  when 
served  hot.  Add  some  golden  Dutch  butter,  which  by 
the  way  is  unsalted,  to  the  golden  meat,  and  you  despise 
the  namby-pamby  “ stay-at-home.”  Then  the  Australian 
steamer  arrives  once  a week  with  Queensland  mutton  and 
beef,  to  take  the  place  of  the  Chinese  water-buffalo  and 
humped  cattle  from  the  West  River  hills.  The  Chinese 
also  offer  you  a turkey,  which  if  lacking  in  gameness  and 
color,  supplies  a soft  delicacy  of  flesh  which  is  a wel- 
come substitute  for  our  bird.  The  furniture,  paneling 
and  flooring  of  this  club,  like  in  the  other  fine  buildings 
of  luxuriant  Hong-Kong,  is  all  of  Siamese  or  Javanese 
teak,  which  is  the  most  durable,  hardest  to  carve  and 
costliest  of  woods.  It  has  a close  grain  and  is  polished 
in  its  natural  color,  which  is  red.  This  is  the  wood  which 
is  brought  at  great  cost  to  America,  to  undersheathe  the 
armor  of  battleships.  The  fine  carving  is  done  by  Can- 
tonese in  those  wonderful  shops  of  scented  chips  along  the 
narrow  Sun  Tau  Lan,  Yuck  Tsze,  Tai  Sun,  and  Old 
Factory  Streets.  The  beautiful  new  Hotel  Mansions,  at 
the  water’s  edge ; the  King  Edward ; the  famous  old  brick 
Jnn,  the  Hong-Kong,  with  its  roster  of  ten  thousand 
world’s  notables ; and  the  unique  Peak  Hotel,  nursed  near 
the  summit  above  the  clouds  in  Victoria  Gap,  are  all 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA  ii 

hostelries  excellent  enough  to  grace  the  Strand  or  Fifth 
Avenue.  The  Peak  Hotel  is  the  center  of  the  garrison 
social  life,  and  every  dinner  is  a glitter  of  regalia,  braid, 
buttons,  forgivable  swagger  and  affected  intonation. 
You  will  notice  the  menus  have  numbers  opposite  each 
item;  brinjals  may  be  number  fourteen;  marmalade,  six- 
teen; vegetable  marrow,  eight,  and  likewise  with  the 
wine  list;  the  boy  would  not  know  what  you  meant  by 
Sparkling  Moselle,  but  tell  him  number  six,  and  you 
will  have  your  wine.  The  little  cube  of  ice  is  re- 
moved from  your  cocktail  after  it  has  chilled  it,  and  is 
used  to  perform  the  same  service  in  your  neighbor’s  glass. 
Torrid  as  is  the  climate,  fleeting  as  is  the  life  of  the  cube, 
its  service  is  a remarkably  long  one,  for  at  the  bars  of 
these  treaty  ports  of  the  Orient  the  line  of  customers  is 
well  filled,  and  be  it  said  that  American  drinks  reign. 
When  you  permanently  locate  at  a hotel  or  club  you  are 
expected  to  bring  in  your  own  house  boy  to  wait  upon 
you,  the  hotel  only  providing  waiters  for  transients. 
How  one  gets  to  hate  the  hot  red  heathen  hills  where 
never  for  a moment  in  the  long  exile  once  lies  the  famil- 
iar snow  lines  of  home,  and  the  first  sight  of  snow  on 
Mt.  ^tna  fills  the  returning  wanderer  with  a thrill  which 
can  only  be  understood  by  experiencing  it.  You  believe 
then  that  snow  is  the  sign  of  the  Saxon  character. 

As  the  expatriated  Chinese  sighs  for  his  eel,  mullet 
and  native  quail,  to  be  brought  alive  to  him  across  the 
wide  Pacific,  a thirty-days  voyage,  so  the  white  man  in 
China  longs  most  of  all  for  frozen  American  oysters.  It 
is  the  mess  of  pottage  for  which  he  endures  exile,  and 
with  a tin  and  a cronie,  he  is  able  to  knock  through  an- 
other twenty  days  until  the  next  steamer,  with  a cold  stor- 
age plant,  arrives,  when  he  forthwith  hails  a sampan,  and 


12 


THE  CHINESE 


with  a Lucullian  smile,  sails  to  make  a studied  flank  at- 
tack on  the  steward. 

Nowhere  in  the  world  perhaps  are  lantern  illumina- 
tions more  indulged  in,  and  certainly  nowhere  so  effect- 
ively. The  terraced  homes  all  have  the  mountain  peak 
as  background,  and  whether  one  looks  from  the  bottom 
of  the  cup  up  the  illuminated  hills,  or  down  upon  the  mil- 
lion lights  which  no  factory  smoke  clouds,  to  the  water, 
and  the  fish  lantern  procession  passing  through  the  lower 
streets  and  prayas,  the  view  is  glittering  and  multi- 
colored. The  natives  are  especially  lavish  of  lanterns  in 
the  time  of  the  sixth  moon,  when  every  shop  is  radiant 
with  a lighted  crab,  fish,  fowl,  or  dragon,  the  ingenuity 
in  design  surpassing  the  more  classic  Japanese  fashion  in 
lanterns. 

No  other  race  has  looked  upon  the  waters,  and  find- 
ing them  more  level  than  the  land,  with  quick  wit  and 
sense,  said  that  there  by  hundreds  of  thousands  they 
would  anchor  their  tax-free  homes.  Hong-Kong  and 
Canton  best  present  this  unique  spectacle,  and  the  most 
moving  sight,  emotionally  and  literally,  in  the  world,  is 
when  this  immense  populace  is  stirred  by  news  of  an  ap- 
proaching typhoon.  Sails  are  hoisted,  sculls  and  oars 
put  to  work,  and  a dozen  times  a year  a vast  armada 
sweeps  like  the  scuds  of  clouds  along  the  harbor,  to  an- 
other place  of  safety  beneath  a great  mountain  peak. 
How,  on  their  return  to  the  accustomed  anchorage,  they 
settle  their  position  by  number  and  lane,  no  one  of  us 
JVat  I (outer  barbarians)  has  ever  yet  been  able  to 
determine,  but  sampan  and  junk  certainly  drop  into  posi- 
tion as  quickly  as  if  drilled  by  a fleet-captain.  Which- 
ever foreigner  can  discover  the  key,  will  have  given  proof 
of  his  genius  to  camp  an  army  better  than  a Cyrus,  or 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA  13 

shall  we  say  as  well  as  the  local  Yuan  Shi  Kai,  on  whose 
kind  the  hopes  of  militant  China  rest. 

The  exile’s  solemnity  is  coaxed  with  the  superb  music 
on  the  Parade  Ground  three  times  a week  of  the  several 
military  bands,  and  indeed  one  hotel  makes  a feature  of 
employing  the  Baluchi’s  Indian  band  and  pipers  during 
dinner.  If  nearly  everybody  else  loafs  on  foreign  duty, 
the  band  is  never  idle.  Too  often  it  is  Saul’s  march  and 
extra  slow  step,  along  the  Wong  Nei  Chong  Road  past 
the  monument,  to  the  hill  side  cemetery,  for  too  many 
a comrade  who  has  died*  of  drink,  melancholy,  or  ma- 
laria. The  firing  party  loses  no  time  in  signaling  among 
the  peaks  that  another  of  the  king’s  soldiers  has  been 
laid  to  his  everlasting  rest  in  the  compulsory  land  of  his 
exile,  only  twelve  hours  after  his  death.  Then  it  is  a pip- 
ing march  back  to  the  barracks  at  quick  step,  for  the  of- 
ficers greatly  fear  the  effect  upon  unaroused  men.  A 
battle  is  less  depressing  to  them,  with  its  hastily  gathered 
dead  on  the  field,  than  the  draped  gun-carriage  and  fu- 
nereal pomp  at  the  door  of  the  barracks  hospital.  There 
is,  besides,  playing  in  the  barracks  garden,  for  officers’ 
guest  night,  and  music  for  the  theater,  all  crowded  into  a 
week,  together  with  countless  marches  to  be  played  from 
the  landing  wharf  to  Government  House  steps  for  many 
a braided  Siamite,  Nipponite  and  other  Jebusite,  who,  by 
adopting  the  comity  of  nations,  has  perforce  bowed  to 
the  yoke  of  our  unpicturesque  tailors.  The  German  flag- 
ship Hertha  drops  into  port,  and  in  an  evening  or 
two  afterward  the  German  Club,  established  in  a beauti- 
ful Renaissance  building  on  Kennedy  Road,  announces 
that  the  warship’s  splendid  string  band  will  give  a 
musicale,  which  is  more  clannishly  attended  than  the 
artistic  treat  warrants. 


14 


THE  CHINESE 


And  whenever  Neptune  and  Mars  meet  and  kowtow, 
as  they  are  always  doing  here,  the  gunners  may  be  asleep 
and  the  muzzles  may  be  capped,  but  the  Tommies  who 
“ blow  their  lives  out  in  China  ” in  more  ways  than  this 
particular  one,  must  ever  be  on  hand  with  cornet  and 
trombone  to  make  admiral  and  general  extra-congratu- 
latory, The  philosophizing  Chinese  tax-payer,  who 
comes  down  from  Canton  on  these  occasions,  again 

shakes  hands  with  himself,  and  explains  that  he  insti- 

tuted the  custom  of  skimping  on  public  works  and  being 
lavish  in  imposing  taxes  for  ceremonies’  sake.  None 

of  the  treaty  ports  equals  Hong-Kong  in  musical  lux- 

uries. Manila  has  one  famous  Filipino  band  and  Sir 
Robert  Bredon  at  Peking  has  a Chinese  band,  both  trained 
by  occidental  masters. 

It  is  an  English  colony,  this  island  which  dropped 
as  a first  fruit  from  the  folds  of  the  flag  of  the  Opium 
War,  but  Englishmen  rule  by  suggestion  more  than 
compulsion.  They  endow,  of  course,  but  they  have 
elasticity  of  judgment  enough  to  adopt,  and  this  is  why 
they  are  successful  colonial  rulers.  The  water  front 
they  have  called  a Praya,  from  the  custom  at  famous 
old  Portuguese  Macao,  forty  miles  away.  A walk  here 
(and  every  one  walks  on  the  street  instead  of  the  side- 
walk) is  a kaleidoscope  of  dress  and  a College  of 
Languages.  Here  are  good  Scotch  names  like  Mathie- 
son;  Japanese  like  Mitsui;  German  like  Melchers;  Por- 
tuguese like  De  Mello;  Netherlands  like  Stoomvaart 
Maatschappij ; Parsees  like  Cawasjee  Moosa;  and  In- 
dian like  Matab.  A European  has  just  got  out  of 
a Sedan  chair,  which,  as  rain  is  threatening,  has  the  cur- 
tains down.  They  are  dyed  in  the  familiar  yin-chi,  or 
Chinese  red.  The  Hok-Lo  bearers  are  ringing  the  coin 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


15 


on  the  pavement  to  see  if  it  is  good  and  if  a slight  tip 
is  not  given  them  they  proceed  to  berate  the  unsuspecting 
passenger  in  their  twangy  dialect.  As  the  coolies  walk 
off,  be  sure  to  notice  if  the  right  leg  of  the  trousers  is 
rolled  up  and  the  left  down.  It  is  a frequent  sign  of 
membership  in  an  anti-dynastic  society,  such  as  the  Triad. 
Their  trousers  are  of  hard  Nanking  cloth,  which  has  been 
dyed  black  with  gambier.  Here  are  Koreans  with  tiny 
black  bamboo-fiber  hats,  perched  on  their  rolled  up  hair. 
Their  baggy  white  trousers  flutter  in  the  wind;  their 
Eton-like  tunics  are  tight.  A Taoist  priest  comes  along, 
wearing  his  hair  on  the  top  of  his  head  and  not  down  his 
back,  as  most  Chinese  do.  An  Episcopal  bishop  passes 
in  regalia  which  concedes  something  to  the  East,  while 
he  remains  reminiscent  also  of  the  Occident;  a sun-topy 
crowning  a black  morning  coat,  knickerbockers,  silk 
stockings  and  pumps.  His  Catholic  confrere,  who  is  a 
Portuguese  by  blood,  wears  the  familiar  long  black  gown 
of  his  ilk  and  a cross,  but  notice  his  sun-helmet  and  that 
his  beads  are  of  native  jade.  Belgian  monks,  who  would 
crucify  the  flesh,  stick  to  black  Friar  hats  which  focus  the 
actinic,  merciless  rays  of  the  sun  upon  their  devoted  but 
dizzy  heads.  That  gaunt  gentleman  under  a gray  Fe- 
dora is  the  best  shot  in  the  colony.  He  has  just  beaten 
the  governor  at  the  traps  of  the  Royal  Gun  Club  in  the 
Wanchai  gulley.  He  is  known  as  a “ manufacturer’s 
agent,”  but  darkly  it  is  said  that  his  real  business  is  the 
smuggling  of  arms  into  China.  Anyway,  as  he  is  only 
a cooee  (Australian)  he  is  given  the  cold  shoulder 
at  the  English  club  on  the  Praya.  When  he  and  a stocky 
Canadian  there  get  mad  about  it,  they  chum ' and  rub 
“ Paardeburg  ” into  those  whom  they  call  in  the  hour 
of  their  wrath  “ snobs,”  “ Pharisees  ” and  “ Little 


i6 


THE  CHINESE 


Englanders.”  The  Frenchman  who  overhears  it  all 
says: 

“ Mais  en  guerre, 

“De  meme  que  freres!” 

As  your  ’rickisha  rolls  toward  the  Polo  Ground  at 
Causeway  Bay,  Chinese  boys  turn  pin-wheel  somersaults 
and  pipe  forth  a petition  for  “ cumshaw.”  One  of  the 
four  carriages  of  the  Colony  passes  along,  drawn  by  tiny 
Chinese  ponies.  It  contains  the  powdered  and  carmined 
wives  of  a native  banker  of  Bonham  Strand.  There 
comes  a Dom  from  India,  his  tall,  thin  limbs  swathed 
tightly  in  a white  chadar,  which  answers  for  garment 
by  day  and  bed-sheet  by  night,  and  his  head  (all  but  the 
black  buffalo  eyes)  is  hid  beneath  a tremendous  red  tur- 
ban. With  eyes  averted  from  the  Dom  a couple  pass, 
Jyotishi  Essabhoy  — a silk  merchant  once  of  Calcutta  — 
and  his  wife,  who  wears  a wonderful  one-piece  silk  sari, 
which  is  caught  at  the  waist  and  half-looped  around  the 
body.  The  other  half  is  thrown  over  the  head  and 
shoulders.  She  was  born  in  Ceylon,  where  all  the 
women  learn  the  carriage  of  a Venus  of  Milo  from  the 
habit  of  bearing  water  jars  on  their  heads.  Soft  is  her 
walk  and  voice,  which  latter  purrs  along  with  the  subdued 
answers  of  her  lord,  whose  race  has  never  learned  the 
confident  manners  of  those  who  are  used  to  ruling  others. 
Following,  is  an  Indian  officer  of  the  Baluchis,  whose 
march  is  as  stately  as  a column  from  the  Taj  Mahal. 
You  can  tell  that  that  other  tall,  independent-looking  fig- 
ure, swathed  in  white  from  turban  to  turned-up  shoe,  is  a 
Mahratta  from  Bombay,  for  if  he  were  a Hindoo  from 
Benares  his  dhotee  cloth  would  be  gay  in  color.  Shorter 
than  either,  comes  another,  his  hair  dressed  with  tortoise 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


17 


shell  combs.  He  hails  from  Ceylon  and  wears  a comboy- 
skirt  of  checked  cloth,  and  by  trade  is  a vender  of  ame- 
thysts and  precious  stones.  Truth  with  him  is  a pearl 
of  great  price,  and  he  therefore  indulges  in  the  cheaper 
imitations  when  he  deals  with  the  inexperienced.  A Bur- 
man,  tattooed  and  looking  afraid,  steps  by  in  ladies’ 
shoes  and  putsoe  skirt,  but  he  has  a man’s  voice,  which 
disillusionizes  you.  There,  too,  goes  Chang,  the  coolie, 
with  his  string  of  goats,  which  he  milks  at  the  doors  of 
his  customers.  On  the  wet  stone  steps  in  front  of  the 
Fish  Market,  labors  with  the  pitch  baskets  one  who  has 
been  a pirate  on  the  Si  Kiang,  and  who  dipped  his  hands 
in  white  man’s  blood  when  the  Sainam  was  attacked. 
He  will  gather  water-front  news  for  a season,  unless  the 
Inkong  of  the  law  meanwhile  recognizes  and  gathers  him. 
Japanese  courtezans  from  Ship  Street,  dressed  in  their 
blue-figured  kasuri  cloth,  shuffle  by  on  wooden  shoes. 
The  Chinese  fokis  greet  them  with  Abderian  laughter, 
screaming  “ pig  ” after  them,  and  the  Japanese  sailors 
are  ready  enough  to  fight  with  knives  on  the  pretext  of  a 
harlot  for  the  honor  of  a flag.  A Hebrew,  who  wor- 
ships at  “ Othel  and  Leah,”  on  Robinson  Road,  drifts  by 
on  the  wind  behind  the  only  cloud  of  whiskers  east  of 
Calcutta.  He  is  one  of  the  daring  few  who  wears  a 
derby  hat  instead  of  a topy.  A chimney-hatted  Parsee, 
looking  very  confidential  in  black,  and  sporting  a pink 
ruby  of  faultless  water,  passes  with  his  secrets  of  what 
fine  English  young  gentleman  (all  too  forgetful  that  in 
this  blistering  climate  a European  can  be  imprisoned  for 
debt)  owes  him  money,  and  his  nervous  fingerings  and 
whisperings  are  doubtless  a part  of  the  process  of  mental 
arithmetic.'  The  Parsee  has  progressed  in  the  far  East 
since  the  days  when  he  sat  on  a cotton  cloth  on  the  floor 


i8  THE  CHINESE 

and  ate  his  food  from  a plantain  leaf  or  a piece  of  Ben- 
ares brass. 

The  mansions  of  Belilios  on  MacDonald  Road  and 
those  of  Mody  and  Chater  are  the  show  houses  of 
Hong-Kong  and  the  Colony  has  no  citizens  who  equal 
their  generosity,  a pretty  touch  of  personal  sentiment  for 
the  king  who  has  noticed  them,  warming  their  public 
acts.  They  are  few  in  numbers,  these  Zoroastrians,  but 
an  unusual  fire  burns  in  their  minds  and  hearts,  as  well 
as  in  their  worship.  A people  of  no  country,  it  is  mov- 
ing indeed  to  hear  them  sound  with  a sonorous  earnest- 
ness and  sweetness  the  words  “ our  home,”  when  refer- 
ring to  whatever  land  in  which  they  have  cast  their  lot. 
A people  of  no  God,  in  whatever  alien  scene,  at  even  they 
climb  the  hills  to  follow  with  worshipping  eyes  and  re- 
signed mien  the  fast  dropping  orb  of  the  sun,  which  now 
is  life-giver  and  anon  their  destroyer  in  the  hour  of  death. 

It  is  against  the  law  to  traffic  in  lottery  tickets,  but  that 
oily  Fong,  whom  you  see  slipping  in  and  out  of  European 
hongs,  has  a choice  assortment  of  crisp  green  tickets  of 
the  Han-kau,  Macao  and  Formosa  lotteries,  and  for  a few 
extra  cash  he  will  also  sell  you  the  lucky  tip  on  the  draw- 
ing, which  divination  he  procured  for  a consideration 
from  a top-knotted  Taoist  priest.  Tall  Sikhs,  wearing 
the  red  of  the  king,  march  by  as  straight  as  fir-poles, 
while  a stocky  little  Welsh  “Tommy”  remarks:  “ Ts 

long  pipe-ligs  might  beat  hus  hup  the  first  ’ill,  but  ’ead  be 
flat-blowed  in  the  second  valley,  when  we’d  be  strong 
going  the  third  ’ill ; it  ain’t  ligs,  it’s  wind.” 

With  a privileged  swing  of  the  free  arm,  a stamp  of 
the  off  foot,  and  a cry,  “ Look  out  for  your  heels,”  red- 
liveried  coolies  bluster  by.  Everybody  looks;  it  is  the 
British  governor  of  Hong-Kong  being  borne  in  the  red 


COovaiGHT.  OT  uxoeawooo  d ^xoiAwooD,  X,  y. 

gueen's  Road  Central,  Hong  Kong.  South  China,  showing  side- 
walks under  second  stories  of  buildings  so  as  to 
afford  protection  from  the  sun. 


Ilontj  Koiifj.  Western  seetion,  Iniilt  on  the  slopes  of  Mounts  \ ietoria 
and  Davis.  British  erniser  " I'alhot  " insliore.  I Ids  vessel 
saved  from  drowning;  the  erews  of  the  Russian  war- 
shijjs  " \ ariajj  " and  " Korietz,"  sunk  hy  the 
|ai)anese  at  ('heinuli)o  in  1904. 


Looking  from  mountain  road  down  the  slopes  of  Hong  Kong  upon 
mountain-encircled  harbor  and  British  settlement  of  Kowloon, 
on  the  mainland  of  China.  British  and  German  cruisers 
and  torpedo  boats  in  offing.  Union  and  Christ 
Episcopal  churches  and  British  Governor's 
residence  in  left  foreground. 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


19 


chair  of  a mandarin.  Remember  that  the  natives  them- 
selves do  not  use  the  word  “ mandarin  (which  is  Portu- 
guese), but  “ Kwun.”  Red  of  a brighter  shade  is  used 
only  for  Hwa  Kiao  or  bridal  chairs.  I saw  a crowd  run- 
ning to  Blake  Pier  to  see  the  only  citron-yellow  sedan 
chair  in  town;  it  was  for  the  late  emperor’s  brother, 
Prince  Chun,  now  regent,  who  was  on  his  way  to  Ger- 
many to  apologize  for  the  murder  of  the  German  ambas- 
sador. Every  foreigner  whose  salary  is  above  seventy- 
five  dollars  gold  a month  retains  a passenger  chair,  which 
is  carried  by  two  or  four  coolies,  who  are  uniformed  as 
conspicuously  as  purse  will  allow.  Ctesar  in  an  effort  to 
extirpate  effeminateness  among  the  patricians,  prohibited 
the  use  of  litters,  but  the  excuse  eloquent  Hong- Kong 
could  offer  is  that  it  is  more  hilly  than  Rome. 

During  a royal  procession  the  Chinese  guard,  which 
patrols  the  line  of  march,  turns  volte  face,  for  it  would 
be  intrusive  for  a soldier  to  look  upon  the  royal  chair. 
Only  members  of  the  royal  family  may  use  yellow  sedan 
chairs.  How  quickly  the  Chinese  Club  of  Hong-Kong 
got  the  ochre  pot  to  work,  when  they  heard  a royal  prince 
was  coming ! Only  royalty  may  have  borne  before  it  the 
flag  with  the  five-clawed  dragon;  the  people  must  use  a 
four-clawed  emblem.  A yellow  Lo,  or  state  umbrella,  is 
carried  before  the  procession.  You  will  notice  that  the 
Chinese  gentlemen  and  their  clerks  are  vigorously  fan- 
ning themselves,  and  the  fan  is  more  used  by  men  that 
women.  A Chinese  not  only  fans  his  face,  but  opens  his 
long  silk  tunic  and  fans  his  body,  or  bends  his  neck  to  fan 
his  back.  The  fan  is  carried  in  the  back  of  the  neck  and 
protrudes  over  the  shoulder.  These  cheap  paper  fans  are 
made  at  Nanking,  seventy  thousand  people  deriving  their 
livelihood  from  the  manufacture.  The  Hakka  boat  peo- 


20 


THE  CHINESE 


pie  could  never  get  on  without  fans,  for  their  fires  are 
made  of  charcoal  in  a pan,  and  when  meals  are  being  pre- 
pared the  children  stand  by  on  the  poop  and  vigorously 
work  up  a draft.  But  the  oddest  use  is  when  a host  or- 
ders his  servant  to  fan  a seat  so  as  to  cool  it  for  the  guest. 

Where  one’s  pores,  in  a most  humid  temperature  of 
ninety-five,  perforce  do  much  of  the  work  of  the  kidneys, 
it  is  highly  important  that  washable  white  clothes  should 
be  worn.  A few  martyrs  to  convention  deserve  renown, 
however  — the  governor’s  secretary,  who  is  doomed  to  a 
plug  hat  and  Piccadilly  frock-coat,  and  the  aide-de-camp, 
in  braid  and  pilot  cloth. 

The  Chinese,  especially  in  the  West  End,  is  in  all  the 
glory  of  his  habitat,  and  is  an  unexpectedly  dignified  en- 
tertainer of  the  many  voluble  or  alarmed  looking  Occi- 
dentals. He  has  his  own  splendid  banks,  like  the  Yuen 
Fung  Yuen  on  Bonham  Strand,  and  native  hospitals,  like 
the  Chung  Wah.  He  frequently  loans  to  the  British  a 
countryman  as  lukong,  who  is  forthwith  dressed  in  that 
wonderful  mixture  of  mushroom-shaped,  white  bamboo 
helmet;  blue  tunic;  engineer’s  white  leggings  and  native 
felt  soles.  Who  is  that  peddler  whirling  a strident  rattle 
around  a bamboo  stick,  and  carrying  a chest  of  drawers? 
He  is  the  embroidery  vender.  Every  girl  and  woman 
decorates  her  own  shoes  and  a visit  of  the  peddler  of  silk 
floss  and  gold  and  silver  thread  is  a daily  necessity.  A 
gloriously  carved  bright  red  chair,  decorated  with  king- 
fishers’ feathers,  is  borne  along.  It  contains  a bride  and 
everybody  laughs.  The  chair  is  kept  for  nothing  else  at 
the  livery.  China,  beyond  all  lands,  revels  in  colors. 
Native  youths  in  long  gowns  of  blue,  buff  and  purple; 
Chinese  women  in  tunics  and  trousers  of  yellow,  red, 
black  and  gold ; and  Hindoo  women  in  the  flimsiest  pink 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


21 


silk  from  the  bazaars  of  Calcutta  and  the  downiest  shawls 
from  Cabul,  make  a joyous  scene  on  the  wide  Praya  and 
hill-side  roads  of  the  oddest  tilted-up  Colony  in  the  world. 
Occasionally  a Eurasian,  stouter  than  either  European 
or  Chinese,  and  whose  blood  kinship  neither  boasts 
of,  with  hair  hanging  loose,  passes  by,  to  the  un- 
heeded shame  of  the  foreigner.  It  is  an  evidence  of 
the  vast  passive  virtues  of  the  Chinese  that  they 
do  not  rise  up  and  behead  every  foreigner  in  the 
Colony  as  an  offering  of  vengeance  at  the  feet  of 
the  unnamed. 

To  cool  his  prized  Waler  under  a noble  tamarind, 
and  a cynosure  of  all  eyes  because  of  the  unusual  sight  of 
a fine  animal,  an  English  officer  of  the  Indian  army  mess 
jumps  from  the  saddle,  all  jingling  with  the  parapher- 
nalia of  occidental  war.  He  has  removed  his  heavy  topy- 
helmet,  which  is  filled  with  cool  plantain  leaves,  and  is 
ornamented  with  a blue-  and  white-barred  pugree.  Per- 
haps (for  he  has  lots  of  time)  he  philosophizes  how  signs 
of  subjugation  soon  become  cherished  customs.  The 
queue  of  the  Chinese  was  first  a badge  of  Manchu  author- 
ity imposed  upon  the  conquered;  and  the  Indian  pugree 
was  originally  the  yoke  which  the  Mohammedan  victor 
placed  upon  his  Hindoo  subject.  It  is  the  only  handsome 
feature  of  the  absolutely  essential  but  hideous  Indian  hel- 
met, now  coming  into  universal  use  in  southern  China.  I 
have  noticed  that  in  Marseilles  they  are  numerously  worn 
in  the  summer  months,  which  is  the  result  of  the  example 
of  France’s  returning  Tonquinoise  colonists,  who  use  that 
port  altogether.  Topies  are  beginning  to  be  exhibited  in 
the  show  windows  of  Broadway  hatters’  shops  in  New 
York  City.  As  an  additional  protection  against  the  sun’s 
rays,  the  British  authorities  compel  their  regiments,  on 


22 


THE  CHINESE 


oriental  duty,  to  wear  a strip  of  flannel  down  the  spinal 
column.  The  Oriental’s  respect  for  his  native  sun  is 
strikingly  illustrated  in  the  statue  of  Dai  Butz  at  Kama- 
kura in  Japan,  where  the  head  of  the  saint  is  covered  with 
brass  snails,  which  in  their  art  represent  a cool  protection 
from  the  heat. 

In  Hong-Kong  and  the  Orient,  water  is  king.  It 
rules  for  happiness  and  safety  during  the  short  rainy  sea- 
son, which  commences  in  May,  when  lavish  cloud-bursts 
fall,  as  they  can  do  only  in  the  tropics.  It  tyrannizes  by 
its  stinginess  during  the  dry  season  of  nine  months.  Im- 
agine the  bases  of  a dozen  conical  untenanted  hills,  one 
thousand  eight  hundred  feet  high,  traced  around  with  a 
cemented  trench.  Every  drop  of  water  that  falls  on  the 
hill  preserves  is  eagerly  caught  and  led  to  the  basins  in 
the  valleys.  But  the  consumption,  and  particularly  the 
waste,  by  three  hundred  thousand  Chinese  in  Hong-Kong, 
is  immense.  In  the  broiling  summer,  the  valves  are 
opened  only  night  and  morning,  and  there  is  great  priva- 
tion and  danger  in  a colony  which  is  subject  to  the  rav- 
ages of  smallpox,  typhoid  and  every  other  disease  that 
unflushed  filth  breeds, — not  to  mention  the  discomfort  of 
limited  baths  where  the  body  sweats  without  ceasing. 

The  richer  Europeans  flock  at  five  o’clock  to  the  harbor, 
and  in  launches  seek  out  a spot  where  the  sewage  of  Can- 
ton does  not  lie  like  false  lilies  on  the  wave,  to  enjoy  the 
refreshment  of  a dip  and  swim,  returning  at  seven 
o’clock,  when  the  sudden  sunset  flames  without  heat 
for  a glorious  half  hour,  before  night,  without  a 
twilight,  falls  suddenly  black.  The  launches  are 
abundantly  provisioned  with  tea,  whisky,  soda,  col- 
lation, and  cigars,  and  if  the  native  launchmen  could 
speak  with  the  metaphors  of  our  literature,  they  would 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


23 


certainly  call  us  a race  of  Clodii  from  all  the  ap- 
pearances. The  swimming  parties  leave  the  Queen’s 
Statue  pier  for  Shelter,  Junk  or  Lighthouse  Bays, 
except  when  rumors  go  through  the  Colony  that  a 
shark  has  been  seen  in  the  waters,  and  all  the  terrible 
tales  of  Hong-Kong  becoming  as  dangerous  as  Sydney’s 
harbor  are  told  to  the  terrified  griffin.  The  alarming 
visitor  is  only  the  Peh-ki,  or  great  white  porpoise, 
which  has  wandered  a little  from  his  fishing  grounds  on 
the  Macao  flats  for  a dash  among  the  shipping  and  bays 
of  Hong-Kong.  Nevertheless  for  a week  the  stream  of 
launches  that  nightly  left  the  Matshed  Pier  at  Victoria 
Statue  will  turn  their  noses  toward  Sham-Shui-Po  Bay 
instead  of  Junk  Bay.  The  rivalry  of  the  launches  on 
the  long  sail  is  thrilling;  national,  guild,  district,  social, 
and  professional  feeling  all  coming  into  the  competition 
of  ten  knots  speed.  Junk  Bay  at  low  tide  affords  the 
grandest  bathing.  Not  only  is  the  scenery  stupendous 
and  the  loneliness  primeval  and  alien,  but  you  can  leave 
the  cooler  water  of  the  bay  for  a hot  fresh-water  bath 
in  a sand  basin  at  the  top  of  the  beach,  which  has  been 
heated  by  the  tropical  sun  all  day.  Luxuries  truly 
Pompeiian ! 

Wherever,  among  the  unpreempted  hills,  there  may  be 
a spring,  the  thirsty  Chinese  place  bamboo  runnels  and 
lead  the  trickling  silver  to  the  roadside,  where  patient 
coolies  wait  in  line  for  hours  to  secure  their  own  or  their 
master’s  drinking  water  for  the  day.  The  bottling 
(really  jarring)  and  shipping  of  potable  waters  is  not 
unknown  in  China,  which  land,  after  all,  is  really  the 
universal  inventor.  Near  Sam  Shui,  on  the  West  River, 
is  the  large  Ting  Wo  monastery,  which  is  built  on  the 
cliff’s  side.  Above  it  is  a waterfall,  which  the  bonzes  de- 


24 


THE  CHINESE 


dare  is  sacred  and  possesses  healing  powers.  They  ship 
the  water  all  over  the  country.  If  there  is  anything  a 
Buddhist  priest  loves  as  an  adjunct  to  prayer,  it  is  a little 
of  such  a dignified  and  easily  run  business.  The  Taoist 
priest  is  not  so  exacting  that  the  business  shall  be 
dignified. 

Water  is  Tyrant!  When  he  comes  again,  he  falls  in 
unruly  torrents,  which  sweep  away  the  bounds  of  cement 
and  granite  which  have  been  placed  for  him;  he  drops 
over  cliffs,  and  you  would  not  know  the  arid  peaks  in  this 
new  land  of  thundering  waterfalls  that  leap,  echo  and 
roar  in  the  narrow  gulleys  with  the  alien  voice  of  terror 
and  destruction.  Visible  tongues  of  water  appear  from 
out  the  awful  mist,  which  darkens  even  a tropic  day,  and 
rolls  from  valley  to  valley,  disguising  and  anon  revealing 
every  scene. 

Droll  enough  to  a stranger,  but  terribly  important  to 
a resident,  is  the  item  in  Hong-Kong’s  Government  Bud- 
get entitled  Rat  Estimates,  where  many  thousand  dol- 
lars are  appropriated  yearly  to  battle  with  the  rodent. 
Hong-Kong  has  nearly  conquered  the  mosquito  by  ce- 
menting, in  the  woods,  every  gulley  and  indentation  that 
is  near  a dwelling,  but  the  rat  of  subterranean  secrecy  is 
harder  to  reach,  and  it  is  the  fad  or  fact  in  Bombay, 
Tokio  and  Hong-Kong  to  find  in  him,  and  the  elusive  flea, 
the  transmitters  of  the  virulent  bubo  bacillum.  The  first 
sign  of  plague  in  Chinese  villages  is  that  of  the  rats  leav- 
ing their  haunts,  leaping  around  mad  and  suddenly  drop- 
ping dead  in  the  streets.  Then  as  surely  as  the  pursuer 
of  Pharoah,  comes  the  Destroyer.  Some  say  all  this  care 
is  as  futile  as  offering  rewards  for  rabbits  in  Australia 
or  wolves  in  Russia;  that  the  treacherous  natives  breed 
the  pests  for  the  bounty.  At  all  events,  it  is  not  uncom- 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


25 


mon  to  see  a wily-eyed  coolie  carrying  a dozen  live  rats 
in  a wire  cage  to  ofifer  to  the  sanitary  board  in  the  bal- 
conied yellow  building  which  rises  over  the  Parade 
Ground,  and  who,  like  every  hunter,  takes  his  reward  in 
the  silence  that  clothes  the  brave.  Nor  is  rodent  immi- 
gration permitted;  every  steamboat  and  foreign  launch 
that  ties  up  to  the  Praya  has  to  submit  to  funnel-shaped 
tin  guards  being  placed  upon  its  lines,  so  that  if  Mr.  Rat 
intends  to  come  ashore,  he  must  not  do  so  furtively,  but 
decently,  as  any  first-class  passenger,  down  the  main  gang- 
way, where  his  credentials  will  be  passed  upon.  But  this 
is  the  only  restriction  at  this  free  port,  where  everybody 
and  everything  comes  sometimes,  which  is  the  unique 
characteristic  of  this  truly  entertaining  port.  The  na- 
tives are  much  opposed  to  the  dreaded  white-uniformed 
Sanitary  Corps,  whose  members  break  into  the  plague- 
infected  houses  with  disinfection  oven,  sprayers,  brooms 
and  tubs.  Lau  Chu  Pak,  in  a memorial  to  the  govern- 
ment, calls  the  corps  “ those  Rat  Kings,  because  of  their 
arrogance  in  dashing  in  and  out  with  what  they  have 
destroyed,  while  the  owners,  in  convict-like  garments 
provided  by  the  board,  watch  with  sad  faces  the  touching, 
and  for  them,  impoverishing  scene.”  So  a beneficent  and 
wise  government,  even  at  the  ends  of  the  earth,  has  its 
caustic  critics. 

Another  abhorred  feature  of  government  is  the  lime- 
washing, which  effectually  destroys  the  micro-organisms 
of  plague,  enteric  and  cholera,  which  may  settle  upon  the 
walls.  If  an  outbuilding  is  suspected  of  harboring  dis- 
ease it  is  sprayed  white  by  the  Sanitary  Corps,  which  cus- 
tom adds  not  a little  to  the  picturesqueness  of  the  Chinese 
villages  which  lie  beneath  the  banyan  and  tamarind  trees, 
and  on  the  terraces  of  the  black  disintegrating  granite 


26 


THE  CHINESE 


hills,  and  green  slopes.  Such  a requirement  could  not  be 
followed  inland  in  China  proper,  because  the  natives  fear 
spraying  with  white,  which  is  their  color  of  death. 

Government  also  pounces  hard  upon  the  flour  shops, 
where  fokis  are  re-bagging  cheap  flour  in  bags  of  su- 
perior brand,  and  many  a war  waves  to  and  fro  in  the 
courts  as  to  whether  the  Three  Combed  Cock  was  in  the 
Red  Bamboo  bag. 

In  the  “ chit  ” system,  the  Colony  rebels  at  the  sug- 
gestion that  it  is  not  walled  off  from  all  the  world.  It 
takes  three  months  to  establish  your  identity.  There- 
after all  your  purchases  are  signed  for  by  I.  O.  U.’s,  or 
“ chits,”  which  are  torn  out  of  the  merchant’s  stub  book. 
No  one  carries  the  money  of  the  British  or  Chinese 
realms,  which  happens  to  be  Mexican  silver, — it  is  too 
heavy.  Even  at  the  hotel  bars,  you  do  not  pay  for  your 
liquor  when  it  is  drawn  for  you,  for  obliging  Sam  Lin, 
whose  legend  is  that  “ Heaven’s  smile,  like  his  own,  is 
wide,”  hands  you  an  account-book  in  which  you  are  asked 
to  make  your  own  entry.  On  the  irregularity  of  the 
writing,  when  the  chit  is  presented,  hangs  many  a tale. 
Once  a month,  the  various  merchants  bring  these  signed 
chits  to  your  hong  comprador  or  cashier,  who  de- 
ducts them  from  your  wages  or  account,  and  the  balance 
is  brought  to  you,  together  with  the  canceled  chits.  Thus 
every  firm’s  cashier  acts  as  the  private  banker  of  the  em- 
ployee. No  interest  is  allowed  or  charged,  but  if  it  were, 
the  credit  would  be  on  the  side  of  the  patient,  kindly  Chi- 
nese. These  compradors  are  of  course  heavily  bonded 
to  the  firms  or  companies.  They  act  in  a sense  as  the  for- 
eign firm’s  Chinese  member,  and  handle  all  the  diplomatic 
dealings  with  the  natives.  Their  association  or  club  is 
one  of  the  most  important  sureties  of  business  stability  in 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


27 


each  Colony  or  treaty  port.  The  word  “ hong  ” literally 
is  a row,  and  was  first  applied  in  the  old  days  of  inter- 
course with  Europe,  to  the  dreary  line  of  windows  in  the 
foreign  warehouses  at  Whompoa,  near  Canton.  It  is 
now  used  to  cover  a firm,  as  well  as  its  building.  The 
word  “ Taipan,”  used  for  the  chief  of  an  office,  comes 
from  “ Tai-poa,”  a village  headman,  or  non-commis- 
sioned mandarin. 

The  premier  event  of  the  year,  so  far  as  Europeans  in 
the  Orient  are  concerned,  is  the  ball  on  St.  Andrew’s  Eve, 
which  would  make  it  appear  that  the  merchant  princes  of 
the  East  are  Scotch.  St.  George’s  Hall  is  hired, — it  is 
half  of  the  artistic  City  Hall.  Lanterns  are  hung  around 
the  stone  verandas.  The  tramway  to  the  Peak  an- 
nounces that  there  will  be  a two  a.  m.  car,  and  special 
cars  at  a heavy  premium  all  night.  The  three  silk  hats 
of  the  mildewed  Colony  are  sought  for  and  brought  forth 
out  of  a maze  of  fungi.  Everybody  else,  who  hasn’t  a 
tartan,  goes  in  full  dress,  but  wears  a steamer  cloth  cap. 
The  admiral  furnishes  a string  band  from  his  battleship. 
The  British  “ General  Commanding  in  China  ” furnishes 
brass  pieces,  and  the  Indian  Baluchis  send  over  their 
pipers  from  Kowloon,  for  they  have  been  practising 
Strathspeys,  Caledonians  and  Eightsomes  for  half  a year 
in  preparation  for  this  event.  The  cellar  is  turned  into  a 
free  wine-room ; the  theater  is  turned  into  a supper-room, 
and  haggis  struts  upon  the  stage.  A company  in  a cor- 
ner of  the  room  are  two-stepping  to  the  music  of  the 
Eightsomes,  and  a fluttering  comment  goes  through 
the  hall : “ There  romp  the  Americans ! ” Ladies  are 

contested  for  in  a manner  which  ruins  Chinese  good  opin- 
ion; there  are  a dozen  tartans  and  a half  dozen  uniforms 
and  dress-suits  fighting  for  the  card  of  Miss  Anaemia,  and 


28 


THE  CHINESE 


divided  dances  prevail.  The  officers  of  the  society  don 
their  kilts  and  wear  a sprig  of  heather  received  in  the 
last  mail  from  home  by  “ P.  and  O.”  steamer.  Here  is 
the  brilliant  scarlet  of  the  Stuarts,  and  the  greens  and 
blues  of  the  Gordons  and  Murrays.  ’Rickishas  and  se- 
dans camp  in  blocks  and  in  the  aisles  between,  the  coolies 
crowd  and  express  undisciplined  delight  to  see  Europe 
in  finery  pass  by  to  the  gala  scene,  and  they  jeer  all  they 
dare  at  the  exposed  shoulders  of  the  women.  The  hot, 
moist  air  holds  the  perfumes. 

For  a week  previous,  practise  dances  have  been  held  at 
five  o’clock,  so  the  sets  are  all  ready  for  rivalry  and  tri- 
umph. There  is  a dais  and  the  " Distinguished  Patron- 
age ” will  mount  it,  though  the  merchant  princes  are 
somewhat  sarcastic  that  the  governor  has  the  interests  of 
the  Chinese  more  at  heart  than  those  of  the  British  mer- 
chants, but  this  has  always  been  the  keen  question  of  for- 
eign colonies,  from  Syracuse  to  the  Congo,  Macao  and 
Hong-Kong.  The  navy  looks  the  manliest  and  has  the 
nonchalance  which  is  popular,  but  it  carries  no  women. 
So  the  ^rmy  rules  the  ball,  for  the  officers  of  the  garrison 
are  paid  extra  allowance  for  “ keep  ” of  families  when  on 
foreign  service.  A German  admiral,  a French  one,  and 
an  Italian  man-of-war  captain  come  and  bring  their  staffs. 
It  is  worth  leaving  Saigon  with  its  transplanted  opera,  to 
attend  the  great  ball  of  Hong-Kong.  It  is  hot  between 
dances,  and  you  lean  over  the  balustrade  of  the  veranda. 
There’s  an  oriental  fragrance  rising  from  the  smoking 
joss-sticks  which  the  coolies  below  have  lit  to  drive  the 
mosquitoes  away.  A lazy  and  nearly  naked  fellow  is 
lying  asleep  in  yoi4r  sedan  chair.  You  vow  that  if  you 
are  sober  when  you  get  in  it,  you  won’t  He  back  and  take 
your  ease  as  you  used  to.  Down  the  hill  at  the  water’s 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


29 


edge  a dozen  launches  are  puffing  at  the  pier,  waiting  to 
return  the  officers  to  their  ships.  Laughter  is  growing 
louder  in  the  cellar,  and  everybody’s  wife  is  left  to  her 
circle  of  a dozen  men  friends  of  her  husband.  She  is 
in  good  hands,  and  he  seeks  relief  with  a hundred  like 
himself  in  the  cellar,  where  a*  hasty  but  gushing  bar  has 
been  installed.  The  punch  counters,  however,  are  erected 
on  the  ball-room  floor.  These  colonial  women  drink 
less  during  evenings  than  mornings;  the  men  seldom 
drink  during  mornings,  but  the  evenings  are  very  moist. 
There  is  perhaps  a famous  “ Forlorn  Hope,”  called  the 
“ Ten  A.  M.  Cocktail  Club,”  which  wends  its  way  across 
the  blistering  white  Praya  to  the  Hong-Kong  Club,  but 
that  belongs  to  the  business  day,  and  has  nothing  to  do 
with  this  ball.  There  is  something  about  the  moist, 
dreamy  tropic  night  which  bids  you  stay ; the  flowers  and 
ferns  give  out  a heavy  perfume,  which  the  tropic  sun 
would  burn  up.  These  are  the  hours  the  festive  Colony 
loves,  for  it  can  then  forget  for  a while  the  fear  of  who 
will  be  the  next  to  fall  a victim  of  sun,  plague,  cholera, 
typhus,  malaria,  or  death-giving  Bal-Tse  fly.  The  day 
after  St.  Andrew’s  rises  upon  a deserted  Colony  so  far 
as  Europeans  are  concerned.  They  awaken  to  philoso- 
phize that  the  abstemious  virtues  of  the  Saint  and  not  his 
popularity  were  meant  to  be  followed,  and  the  Chinese 
overrun  the  Colony  with  an  expansive  smile  and  similar 
quotations  from  native  wits  who  acquired  this  sort  of 
wisdom  before  Noah. 

Hong-Kong  is  a dozen  higher  and  grander  Gibraltars 
clustered  together.  The  fortifying  of,  and  the  road- 
building to  the  strategic  heights  are  rapidly  and  secretly 
progressing.  Tunnels  are  being  bored,  and  the  rocks 
still  unmasked  by  fir-trees,  both  on  the  island  and  China 


30 


THE  CHINESE 


mainland,  facing  Junk  Bay  and  the  wide  Pacific,  are 
beginning  to  bristle  with  guns.  Garrison  life  at  these 
outposts  is  unusually  melancholy;  society  is  impossible, 
as  the  fortifications  are  eight  miles  by  water  from  the 
city,  and  communication  over  the  mountains  is  arduous. 
It  is  not  a question  of  which  is  the  better  of  the  two,  but 
which  is  the  worse,  to  be  of  the  British  Garrison  Artillery 
or  the  Chinese  Lighthouse  Services. 

Here  and  there  are  introduced  interesting  touches  of 
the  conservatism  of  the  old  country,  for  instance,  the 
Ciceronian  motto : “ Esse  quam  videri,"  over  the  door 
of  a steamboat  office.  The  boats  are  Scotch-built,  and 
indeed  “ better  than  they  seem,”  though  the  appearance 
is  surprising  enough  in  this  outlandish  country,  where 
no  such  luxurious  accommodations  for  travel  are  expected 
on  the  heathen  waters,  which  wind  between  the  idol’s 
hills. 

The  siesta  system  has  not  taken  hold  of  busy  Hong- 
Kong  in  the  manner  that  it  has  at  Bangkok  and  Saigon. 
At  Bangkok,  offices  are  shut  from  twelve  noon  till  two- 
thirty  p.  M.,  and  the  only  things  at  work  in  the  street  are 
the  rasping  vultures,  which  have  swooped  down  on  some 
unfortunate  buffalo,  which  has  fallen  in  the  white  road. 
At  beautiful  Saigon,  the  work  of  the  Europeans  begins 
at  seven-thirty  a.  m.,  and  continues  till  ten  o’clock ; then 
every  one  repairs  home  in  his  pousse-pousse  (jinricki- 
sha), has  a bath,  a light  meal,  and  a sleep  during  the 
intense  heat  of  five  hours,  when  even  the  glorious  per- 
fume of  the  ylang-ylang  trees  becomes  a stifling  misery 
of  cloying  sweetness,  all  too  suggestive  of  the  flowers  of 
death.  From  three  p.  m.  to  five  p.  m.  the  offices  are 
again  opened.  At  five  p.  m.  every  one  (the  majority 
being  officers  of  the  Infanterie  Coloniale),  with  all  the 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


31 


exotic  accoutrement  of  the  joyous  houlcz'ardiers  of  Paris, 
goes  driving  in  miniature  victorias  or  mabahars,  behind 
tiny  black  Tonquinoise  stallions  of  marvelous  vigor,  along 
the  red  roads,  and  God  help  your  eyes  if  it  was  noon,  for 
the  glare  is  worse  than  the  flame  of  Japanese  trenches. 
How  sane  the  French  abroad  are  in  matters  of  comfort! 
No  one  in  Saigon  ever  dresses  in  anything  but  white, 
whether  for  opera,  promenade,  business  or  social  tea. 
But  at  British  Hong-Kong,  the  black  broadcloth  dress- 
suit  is  donned  every  night  for  dinner,  in  a climate  which 
is  nearly  as  hot  as  that  of  Saigon’s;  the  hours  of  work 
are  continuous,  and  this  British  Colony  therefore  takes 
vitality  out  of  its  citizens  more  than  any  port  of  the 
Orient.  Its  line  of  invalids  and  derelicts  who  have  fallen 
back  for  repairs,  is  a long  one,  and  not  all  of  them  reach 
Glasgow,  or  even  Chifu,  Yokohama  or  Colombo,  before 
the  chill  ghost-order  “ Halt  ” is  all  too  willingly  obeyed 
for  ever. 

A word  in  passing  on  Hong-Kong’s  architecture,  which 
is  the  grandest  in  the  far  East.  Not  one  coign  of  van- 
tage has  been  missed.  The  whole  city  is  tilted  up  from 
the  water’s  edge  at  an  angle  of  twenty-three  degrees  un- 
der the  triple  guardian  peaks  of  Wanchai,  Victoria  and 
High  West,  which  soar  one  thousand  feet  higher  than  the 
highest  street.  The  building  material  is  generally  brick, 
double-walled  for  coolness  and  also  for  strength  against 
typhoons;  covered  with  plaster  of  local  manufacture, 
called  cluinam,  and  faced  with  granite  which  is  cut  by 
hand  in  the  Kowloon  quarries  across  the  bay.  At  regu- 
lar distances  apart  stand  four  magnificent  Renaissance 
piles  on  the  water’s  edge ; the  Hong-Kong  Club ; Queens, 
Alexandra,  and  Connaught  Road  Chambers.  Swinging 
round  to  the  right  and  left  of  the  official  city  of  Victoria 


32 


THE  CHINESE 


for  nine  miles,  and  rising  eighteen  hundred  feet  in  ter- 
races, and  deep  into  Wanchai,  Victoria  and  Glenealy  Gul- 
leys, creeps  and  spreads  the  imposing  panorama,  all  the 
more  striking  because  you  did  not  expect  it  at  the  world’s 
end.  No  factory  chimneys  soil  the  view ; they  are  hidden 
around  the  curves  at  the  extreme  ends.  There  is  a rich, 
canopied  Corinthian  monument  to  one  whom  the  Chinese 
call  the  “ Black  Queen  of  the  White  British,”  Victoria 
in  bronze,  and  a Clock  Tower  in  Spanish  style.  For  fifteen 
hundred  feet  upward,  trees  wave  everywhere,  and  if  you 
desire  complete  details  of  the  buildings,  you  must  climb 
to  them.  Above  that  height  the  peaks  are  bald,  and  take 
every  color  in  the  changing  light.  In  the  delicious  early 
morning  they  are  blue ; growing  to  gray,  and  in  the  still- 
ness of  the  hot  noon  their  climax  is  as  white  and  insuf- 
ferable as  the  sun  itself.  Then  they  change  to  gray, 
green,  purple  and  gold  again,  as  the  sun  dies  quickly  at 
their  crests,  from  whence  you  will  first  view  two  of  the 
glittering  stars  of  the  Southern  Cross.  The  diamond  on 
the  breast  of  all  this  pomp  is  the  Catholic  Cathedral  on 
Caine  Road,  twelve  hundred  feet  above  the  water.  It  is 
Gothic,  with  a Spanish  effect  in  the  squat  tower.  Con- 
spicuous are  the  great  flying  buttresses,  and  very  beautiful 
is  the  stone  canopy  over  the  entrance  to  the  Nave.  All 
this  stone  carving  was  done  by  Christian  Chinese ; at  least 
they  said  they  were  on  pay  days.  Christ  Episcopal  Ca- 
thedral on  Battery  Path  is  a West  Indian  or  Colonial  adap- 
tation of  Gothic.  The  stucco  has  turned  yellow  and  blue 
with  time  and  damp,  and  there  is  no  place  in  the  island 
where  that  fern  and  tuberose  smell  of  the  tropics  is  so 
prominent,  as  here  under  the  tower  of  Christ’s.  Mt.  Aus- 
tin Barracks  frown  down  fifteen  hundred  feet  of  cliff; 
across  Victoria  Gulley,  which  is  five  hundred  feet  deep, 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


33 


the  admiral’s  residence  holds  a similarly  lofty  perch,  while 
beyond  Wanchai  and  Wong  Nei  Chong  Hills,  scores  of 
peaks  serrate  the  unnamed  and  uninhabited  sky-line  of 
this  grand,  grim  island,  which  holds  in  leash  the  three 
heathen  seas  for  England.  There  are  other  things  placed 
fifteen  hundred  feet  high,  which  could  announce  them- 
selves with  devastating  thunder,  but  there  is  not  a sus- 
picion of  them  in  the  view.  They  are  the  masked  forts 
which  command  the  unfortunately  many  landing  beaches 
on  the  south,  and  the  Green  Island  and  Lyee-moon  Passes 
to  the  inner  harbor,  from  the  West  and  East  respectively. 

The  new  courts  on  Des  Voeux  Road,  and  the  Naval, 
Civil  and  Tung  Wah  Hospitals  on  Kennedy,  Barker  and 
Robinson  Roads,  are  as  impressive  as  anything  of  the 
kind  in  Europe.  Whole  rows  of  buildings  of  hand-cut 
granite  line  Queen’s  Road  Central.  The  domed  Corinth- 
ian pile  of  the  Hong-Kong  and  Shanghai  Bank,  with 
L’Opera  at  Saigon,  are  the  two  finest  buildings  in 
European  design,  in  the  Orient.  Against  the  granite 
grandeur  of  the  double  pillars  of  the  former,  are  set 
double  rows  of  royal  palms,  and  across  the  way  is  a 
glorious  unbroken  bank  of  ferns,  forty  feet  high,  crested 
with  centenarian  banyans.  The  City  Hall,  containing 
the  Royal  Theater,  is  a worthy  nucleus  of  the  ambitious 
civic  architecture.  The  sidewalks  are  unique  in  that  they 
run  under  the  protruding  second  stories  of  the  buildings. 
The  effect  is  not  as  threatening  as  the  overhanging  Eliza- 
bethan buildings  of  Eastgate  Street,  Chester,  or  the 
umbrella  buildings  of  old  Rouen,  as  the  second  story  of 
the  Hong-Kong  buildings  is  supported  with  pillars  which 
are  anchored  to  the  street  curb.  The  use  of  stucco  per- 
mits of  adding  to  line  the  joys  of  color.  There  are  many 
yellow,  blue  and  buff  buildings  which  close  the  eucalyp- 


34 


THE  CHINESE 


tus,  tamarind  or  palm  glades  with  a wall  of  color  which 
is  delightfully  oriental. 

Government  barracks,  severely  plain  and  warlike,  are 
set  in  extensive  stone-paved  courts,  so  that  the  collection 
of  stagnant  waters  under  windows  shall  be  impossible  in 
this  habitat  of  malaria.  The  buildings  all  provide  ve- 
randa space  by  the  use  of  double  walls.  Behind  a charac- 
teristic fence,  half  iron  and  half  stone,  which  you  associate 
with  British  barracks  whether  at  Halifax,  Bermudas, 
Malta,  or  Hong-Kong,  is  a cemetery  in  miniature,  “ for 
pets  of  the  garrison.”  As  the  Colony  has  only  one  street 
or  praya  on  the  water  level,  there  is  an  endless  necessity 
for  stone  bridges  and  revetment  walls.  The  opportunity 
is  taken  advantage  of  in  a manner  not  surpassed  along  the 
Riviera,  and  the  happy  Chinese  has  loaned  to  the  Saxon 
strength  of  wall,  his  ideas  regarding  the  inlaying  of  tile 
fretwork  and  coping  of  colored  porcelain.  The  Hindoos 
have  raised  a beautiful  white  and  canary-yellow  temple 
and  the  Musselmen  have  erected  a characteristic  mosque 
and  minaret. 

Sumptuous  and  commodious  homes,  all  of  an  Italian 
sameness,  and  every  brick,  stone,  tile,  and  beam  of  which 
has  been  laboriously  borne  up  the  mountains  by  coolies, 
are  planted  on  the  ledges  about  Wanchai,  Victoria  and 
Glenealy  Gaps.  Some  day  the  gaps  between  the  re- 
maining twenty  peaks  of  the  island  will  also  be  tenanted. 
Most  picturesque  are  the  zigzag  paths,  which  certify  that 
the  chair  with  four  bearers  is  an  indispensable  adjunct  of 
hill  residence.  Over  Victoria  Peak,  facing  the  south,  is 
perched  the  Hill  Chateau,  or  so-called  summer  resi- 
dence of  the  governor,  in  a land  which  is  all  summer. 
In  design  it  reminds  you  somewhat  of  Chaumont ; a truly 
ducal  dwelling,  but,  oh,  so  melancholy  when  friends  shall 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


35 


have  gone  down  the  lonely  path  homeward,  and  only  the 
wide,  purple,  heathen  Pacific,  with  its  unreal  calm,  un- 
flecked by  a sail,  in  view  in  the  morning.  The  home  of 
the  Royal  Hong-Kong  Golf  Club,  whose  Augustan  motto 
is  Festina  Icnte  (Make  haste  slowly),  is  a worthy  ex- 
ample in  miniature  of  the  genius  of  a talented  local 
architect.  Turner,  who  perpetuates  that  grand  old- 
fashioned  art  spirit  of  refusing  any  contract,  however 
lucrative,  if  the  work  must  be  ugly,  a spirit  which  would 
foam  with  civic  rage  to  behold  that  chimney-building  of 
architectural  brutality  lately  erected  opposite  Trinity 
Church,  New  York.  The  vast  Belilios  Mansion,  with 
its  many  domes,  reminds  one  of  Byzantine  Constanti- 
nople. In  his  old  home  on  Victoria  Peak,  this  Parsee 
gentleman  built  an  aery  outlook  where  the  view  sweeps 
over  a thousand  heathen  hills,  with  many  bays  between, 
while  the  immediate  seat  delights  with  familiar  Grecian 
lines.  Surprisingly  only  one  house  in  the  city,  that,  too, 
owned  by  a Parsee,  uses  lace-like  iron  grilles  in  place 
of  windows,  in  the  delightful  hacienda  fashion  of  Havana 
and  the  hot  towns  of  the  Caribbean.  Truly  this  Hong- 
Kong  builds  with  a taste  and  confidence,  which  have 
made  her  architecturally  the  boast  and  crown  of  the 
whole  Orient.  Britain  has  never  colonized  anywhere  and 
in  her  style  of  building  given  any  intimation  that  she  ever 
meant  to  recede. 

Not  only  the  houses  are  handsome,  but  the  walls  and 
gardens  beneath  your  feet  appeal  to  you  along  Glenealy 
and  Peak  Roads,  which  are  so  steep  that  the  attraction 
is  physical  as  well  as  odorous.  All  this  is  Saxon.  A 
word  for  the  Chinese  type.  On  the  Kowloon  side  of 
the  water,  in  the  bay  where  Admiral  Keppell  practically 
won  Hong-Kong  from  the  herded  junks,  is  the  delightful 


36 


THE  CHINESE 


old  joss  house,  double-roofed,  with  blind  walls.  Study 
its  proportions,  its  ridge,  curling  eaves,  and  the  use  of 
color  on  the  outside  frieze.  Then,  most  beautiful  of  all 
is  the  Joss  House  at  Causeway  Bay;  such  feathery  mul- 
lions  in  the  dainty  windows  which  relieve  the  heavy 
wall;  such  lavish  color;  — the  arches,  the  squat  pil- 
lars beneath  the  circular  balcony,  the  tiny  door  ap- 
propriately narrow  to  let  only  the  secrets  of  the  soul  slip 
out  to  Heaven,  and,  of  course,  the  opalescent  tiled  roof, 
which  is  made  the  most  conspicuous  and  beautiful  part 
of  the  building  in  Chinese  architecture,  while  we  degrade 
it.  The  natives  declare  that  we  Occidentals  are  sinners 
to  expose  what  is  ugliest  to  the  view  of  Heaven  (Tien) 
andl  keep  all  the  beauty  of  walls  to  our  little  selves,  as 
though  we  had  no  hills  where  we  might  climb  and  see  our 
faults  therefrom.  The  native  coolie  has  his  own  names 
for  the  streets : Victoria  Statue  Square  is  “ Black  Empress 
Place  ” ; Queen’s  Road  Central  is  “ Typan’s  Chow  House  ” 
or  “No.  I Jade  House,’’  because  the  Chinese  Club  and 
the  best  native  jeweler  (Wing  Cheong)  are  located 
there;  Caine  Road,  where  the  Catholic  Cathedral  is  situ- 
ated, is  “ Foreign  Devil  Joss  House.’’ 

Imagine  the  entertainment  to  interject  in  this  modern 
city  a characteristic  procession  of  the  Orientals,  such  as 
that  of  the  dragon  lanterns  on  the  evening  of  the  first  full 
moon.  The  mythical  dragon,  called  a “ lung,’’  combines 
the  powers,  virtues  and  characteristics  of  the  popular 
animals;  its  belly  is  soft  as  a frog’s;  it  has  scales  like 
a carp’s,  claws  like  a five-toed  hawk;  a palm  of  a tiger; 
neck  like  a snake’s;  eyes  of  a rabbit;  brow  of  a camel; 
horns  of  a deer,  and  ears  of  a water-buffalo.  The  pur- 
pose of  the  procession,  to  a degree,  is  one  of  exorcism. 
Hundreds  of  silk  lanterns,  si^ed  over  with  a seaweed 


Palatial  double-walled  residence  of  foreigners  on  \ ictoria  and  Kellett 
peaks,  1600  feet  above  Hong  Kong.  South  China. 

Famous  Peak  Hotel  in  left  background. 


COPTHI^HT,  BV  UHDCAWOOO  « UNQIHWOOO,  *■  V. 


Mountain-chair,  four  bearers,  used  on  peak  roads  of  Hong  Kong 
Island,  South  China. 


Lf)vely  Shanieen  Island,  wlicre  foreigners  live,  opiuisite  native  city 
of  Canton,  I ’earl  River,  South  China. 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


37 


glue,  are  tied  to  a long  painted  back ; a wonderfully  real- 
istic lantern  head  and  tail  are  attached,  and  poles  like  the 
feet  of  a centipede  hold  up  the  national  monster.  The 
crowd  catches  these,  and  the  glittering,  swaying,  writhing 
animal  is  borne  through  the  city  to  the  accompaniment 
of  drums,  tom-toms  and  fire-crackers,  for  if  evil  spirits 
hate  anything  in  China  as  elsewhere,  it  is  public  attention 
being  called  to  their  presence.  From  the  Yamen’s  eaves, 
in  the  native  cities  of  the  mainland,  you  will  behold  the 
flaming  beast  slowly  gliding  around  the  corners,  and  a 
Milky  Way  of  lanterns  following  to  the  foot  of  Pagoda 
Hill. 

On  the  ninth  day  of  the  ninth  moon  (our  fall)  the 
newly  arrived  European  in  Hong-Kong  is  amazed  to  see 
thousands  of  Chinese,  gowned  in  their  finery,  climbing 
the  exhausting  road  to  the  Peak,  and  jamming  the  little 
cable  car  which  is  hauled  up  fifteen  hundred  of  the  eight- 
een hundred  feet.  If  the  silks  and  women  were  absent 
it  would  certainly  appear  to  be  an  attack  deploying  on  the 
governor’s  summer  palace.  Lawn  Tennis  Court  and  the 
Signal  Station.  The  same  ascent  is  being  made  by  the 
villagers  up  every  one  of  those  tremendous  fcng-shui,  or 
nature-dominating  peaks  of  the  mainland,  and  broiling 
work  it  must  be  with  only  the  grass-cutters’  paths  and  no 
shade,  for  the  Chinese  long  ago  cut  the  trees  from  all 
their  magnificent  peaks.  Throughout  China  this  reli- 
gious ceremony,  called  locally  “ Chung  Yong  ” (Ascend- 
ing on  High),  is  being  observed.  It  is  identical  to  what 
our  idea  of  the  ascent  of  Ararat  by  the  Hebrews  would 
be,  if  they  desired  to  commemorate  Noah’s  salvation  from 
the  flood.  The  fete  is  one  of  the  most  beautiful  in  senti- 
ment, and  certainly  the  most  picturesque  of  the  many  ob- 
served by  the  Chinese.  Joss  paper  is  of  course  burned. 


38 


THE  CHINESE 


and  tossed  to  the  winds,  and  the  boys  bring  their  kites  and 
assail  the  heavens.  It  is  one  of  the  few  occasions  when 
the  betrothed  among  the  young  people  have  an  oppor- 
tunity to  see  one  another,  and  we  have  very  wilfully  mis- 
understood the  Chinese  on  this  subject.  The  same  festi- 
val is  observed  by  the  Cantonese,  who  leave  the  city  for 
the  White  Cloud  Hills,  where  the  highest  peak  is  ascended 
in  honor  of  Cheng  Sin,  or  Fairy  Cheng,  who  has  bestowed 
good  luck  and  safety,  historically  perhaps  as  far  back  as 
Noah.  In  all  these  pilgrimages  the  Buddhist  monks 
throw  their  monasteries  open  as  hotels. 

When  the  European  stranger  takes  his  first  walk  on 
the  noble  roads  of  Hong-Kong,  one  of  the  things  imme- 
diately to  impress  him  that  he  is  despite  the  architecture 
in  a land  foreign  to  his  own,  is  to  see  the  Chinese  urchins 
standing  under  the  banyan  trees,  with  their  long  bamboo 
poles,  which  they  carefully  work  between  the  branches. 
The  boys  are  snaring  cicadas  with  a glue  which  is  made  of 
fir  ashes  and  rice  paste.  This  ear-splitting  harpist  of  the 
sultry  day  is  a stubby  insect  with  no  beak  and  a body  as 
large  as  that  of  a mouse.  The  native  children  fetter  them 
with  strings,  and  tie  straws  around  their  abdomens  to  irri- 
tate the  insects  to  make  a constant  strumming.  They  also 
tie  them  up  tight  in  foreign  newspapers,  and  exult  as  the 
insect,  with  powerful  wings  and  jaws,  bursts  its  way 
through. 

Whenever  the  foreigner  is  melancholy  in  his  exile; 
when  his  harp  has  been  hung  on  the  willows  or  tamarinds 
for  ennui,  he  may  essay  relief  by  taking  a walk  up  Wynd- 
ham  Hill  Road.  It  is  popularly  known  as  Flower  Street, 
for  the  road  is  banked  solid  with  the  baskets  of  the 
native  gardeners.  In  contretemps,  the  turreted  jail, 
where  incarcerated  Europeans  (unless  they  soon  die  in 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


39 


tropical  confinement)  are  forced  to  malce  cocoanut  coir 
mats,  frowns  down  from  the  top  of  the  street.  In  the 
damp  heat  one  almost  swoons  from  the  perfumes. 
Branches  of  fruit  trees  are  sold  for  their  spangles  of 
plum,  peach  or  cherry  bloom.  There  are  baskets  of  yel- 
low and  white  narcissus  in  February;  the  peony,  which  is 
the  royal  flower  of  China ; tuberoses  stuck  into  hollowed- 
out  bamboos;  fragrant  magnolias,  camellias,  and  calla 
lilies,  which  are  waxy  enough  to  attract  the  appetite.  All 
this  of  white  bloom.  In  July  there  is  the  sacred  purple 
lotus,  as  big  as  a hat,  and  in  fall,  golden  and  pink  chrys- 
anthemums and  red  and  yellow  dahlias  larger  and  finer 
than  we  ever  see  at  home.  Twenty  cents  will  buy  what 
we  at  home  are  able  to  purchase  for  twenty  dollars.  The 
scene  is  not  like  that  in  gentle  Honolulu,  where  the 
Kanaka  women  sit  behind  the  baskets  and  patiently  wait 
for  you  to  choose.  This  is  decidedly  a masculine,  and  it 
is  going  to  be  a strenuous  land.  The  brown  and  nearly 
naked  flower-sellers  raise  their  guild  cries,  and  charge 
you  with  a pannier.  You  have  to  buy  to  escape.  Go 
to  their  gardens  and  they  will  show  you  wistarias  which 
their  great-grandfathers  tended  one  hundred  years  ago. 

Hong-Kong  is  a world-famous  city  of  the  Unroofed, 
twenty  thousand  coolies  having  no  place  on  which  to  lay 
their  heads  each  night,  and  even  if  they  wished  to  pay 
for  a bed,  the  Colony  has  not  been  able  to  provide  Crown 
sites  enough  on  the  rocky  terraces  for  buildings.  On 
D’ Aguilar,  Wyndham,  Wanchai,  Caine,  Connaught,  and 
a dozen  other  roads,  when  the  last  chairs  of  the  white 
gentlemen-taipans  are  being  borne  by  to  their  handsome 
residences  on  the  Peak,  the  first  of  the  great  class  of  the 
Unroofed  follow  along  slowly  to  find  a spot  of  the  stone 
sidewalk  in  recess,  or  a pillar  supporting  the  overhanging 


40 


THE  CHINESE 


second  story,  where  to  prop  themselves,  or  to  He  down, 
for  sleep.  With  a sigh,  they  drop  to  the  pavement  and 
contentedly  say:  “Two  meals  a day,  brother,  but  one 

sleep  at  night,  eh?  ” On  their  backs,  with  knees  up,  and 
hands  under  their  heads  for  a pillow,  they  lie  at  Wanchai. 
Against  the  precious  teak  logs  which  are  destined  to 
undersheath  American  battleships ; against  the  sugar  bar- 
rels at  Taikoo;  the  rope  coils  at  Yaumati;  and  the  gunny 
bales  at  West  Point,  you  can  discover  them  in  hundreds, 
with  a bamboo  near  each  one,  but  not  for  protection,  be- 
cause no  man  can  rob  the  naked.  They  are  the  steve- 
dores ; the  hewers  of  wood,  drawers  of  water,  and  carriers 
of  rice  and  jute;  the  men  who,  without  the  aid  of  steam, 
put  all  the  brawn  against  the  spokes  of  Progress  when  the 
new  day  opens.  Against  the  blind  wall  of  the  jail  on 
Mosque  Street,  they  are  propped, — optimists  they,  who 
say:  “We  are,  after  all,  better  off  than  those  inside,  for 
the  worst  work  is  less  than  the  lightest  shame.”  The 
Chinese  lukong  and  the  red-turbanned  Sikh  chowkidar 
mark  the  regular  patrol  of  British  law,  and  could  be- 
labor every  stretched  out,  upturned  foot,  but  they  for- 
bear, in  that  sanity  which  philosophizes  that  “ they  are 
torn  enough  already  by  honest  toil.”  Fellow  sympathy 
dims  the  eye  of  duty,  and  the  steps  of  authority  die  away 
as  soft  music  upon  the  ears  of  the  most  weary  of  mortals, 
whose  workday  is  from  dawn  till  dark  for  a pittance.  In 
front  of  the  new  flour-mills  at  Junk  Bay,  where  the 
heathen  hills  have  first  heard  the  hum  of  modern  ma- 
chinery, the  dismantled  sailing  ship,  Maple  Leaf,  has 
been  moored  and  her  main  deck  has  been  roofed.  On 
the  ’tween  and  main  decks  hundreds  of  hammocks  have 
been  slung,  and  here  the  native  mill  operatives  find  a 
shelter  at  least  from  the  rains  and  night-dews. 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


41 


An  amusing  feature  of  life  among  the  Indian  colonists 
in  Hong-Kong  is  their  propensity,  when  unemployed,  to 
betake  themselves  to  the  Indian  temple  in  Morrison  Gap. 
Free  food  is  passed  at  the  services,  even  to  white 
strangers.  You  are,  however,  emphatically  commanded 
to  take  off  your  shoes.  There  are  always  twenty  to 
thirty  men  loafing  within  the  sacred  precincts  and  a serv- 
ice is  called  every  time  hunger  gnaws.  All  is  well  until 
rum  is  passed  by  some  sacrilegious  outsider,  when  war 
rains  from  the  dim  clouds  of  religion,  and  Matab  Singh 
and  his  brother  priests  wear  a worried  look  upon  their 
generally  reposeful  features.  At  the  commencement  of 
the  service  the  audience  squats  upon  the  floor.  On  a 
platform  performers  sit  in  the  middle  of  Kyee-wains, 
dexterously  swinging  their  sticks  before  and  behind  them 
on  the  metal  cymbals.  The  music  begins  low,  but  in- 
creases to  a tremendous  noise,  to  which  is  added  the  clap- 
ping of  hands,  until  the  swaying  worshippers  are  worked 
into  the  religious  intoxication  in  which  they  delight. 
The  foregoing  applies  to  the  Hindoo.  The  Mohamme- 
dans among  the  soldiers  have  built  a mosque  and  minaret 
on  the  Chinese  mainland  at  Kowloon,  next  to  their  vast 
parade  ground.  The  call  of  the  blue-turbanned  muezzin, 
ringing  through  the  hot  oriental  night,  does  not  assure 
peace  of  mind  to  the  exile  on  the  occasion  of  his  first 
sleep  away  from  the  home  land,  when  the  knowledge 
comes  upon  him  that  he  is  indeed  stranded  on  a foreign 
shore,  and  that  his  ship  is  now  steaming  far  away  from 
the  harbor,  bearing  onward  the  last  few  white-men 
friends  he  had  made  en  voyage.  Before  long,  however, 
he  himself  will  be  in  the  motley-colored  throng,  admiring 
the  notable  voices  of  the  criers,  and  more  contented  with 
his  interesting  billet  in  the  hypnotic  East. 


42 


THE  CHINESE 


Last  summer,  an  amusing  incident  stirred  the  chow- 
kidars  or  Sikh  police  of  Hong-Kong.  A comrade  who 
had  enlisted  and  grown  comparatively  wealthy  in  the 
Panama  police  service,  on  his  return  to  Hong-Kong,  was 
seen  to  drop  a gold  piece  among  his  comrades’  pennies  in 
the  alms  box  at  the  Mosque.  Immediately,  like  a simoon 
across  the  Jetcha  Doab  of  their  home  land,  all  the  chow- 
kidars  marched  up  Wyndham  Street  on  strike,  and  vocif- 
erated that  they  must  have  their  wages  raised  or  they 
would  emigrate  to  the  American  El  Dorado,  where  the 
princely  price  of  three  dollars  gold  a day  was  paid  to 
chowkidars  of  experience,  ability  to  roll  diphthongs  and 
the  letter  “r,”  and  to  strike  a salute  which  is  as  steady 
as  if  cast  in  bronze.  The  Sikh  in  India  is  as  disciplined 
as  clock-work,  but  in  China  he  is  a boiler  of  conceit  with- 
out a safety  valve.  Opposite  Hong-Kong,  on  the  Yau- 
mati  side,  the  one  hundred  and  nineteenth  regiment  of 
Baluchis  was  quartered.  The  Sikhs  of  the  famous  red- 
barred  Hong-Kong  Regiment,  now  disbanded,  who 
were  crazy  to  get  at  the  Russians  at  Tientsin  in  the 
International  march,  were  never  willing  to  respect  the 
Chinese,  and  the  Baluchis  have  been  equally  undisciplined. 
It  is,  of  course,  partly  their  caste  prejudice  brought  to  this 
Mongolian  land  where  there  is  no  caste.  These  Baluchis 
at  last  disgusted  everybody  by  casting  all  the  honor  and 
discipline  of  a king’s  soldier  aside,  and  waylaying  the 
Chinese  on  the  roads  and  in  their  shops,  and  robbing 
them.  It  culminated  in  a great  race  riot  on  August  23rd, 
which  was  the  first  Hong-Kong  had  exjx^rienced  in  a 
decade.  Swagger  sticks  and  clubs  were  used  by  the 
soldiers  and  bamboos  by  the  Chinese.  The  thick  turbans 
of  the  Indians  saved  their  heads,  but  many  Chinese  skulls 
were  fractured.  Amusing  .scenes  were  presented,  a thin, 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


43 


tall  Indian  grasping  a Chinese  by  the  pig-tail,  while  the 
stout  Chinese  was  reciprocating  by  the  equally  gross  in- 
sult of  unwinding  the  Indian’s  red  turban. 

On  June  nth  the  fire-walking  ceremony  of  Thee- 
miri  takes  place  in  the  walled  court  which  is  connected 
with  every  Indian  temple.  W’eird,  sensuous  and  ghastly 
by  turns  it  is,  altogether  leaving  the  taste  of  ashes  upon 
the  mouth.  The  priests  secure  some  plump  young  girls 
among  the  devotees,  but  most  of  the  thirty  or  forty  are 
toothless  crones  and  haggard  men.  For  days  a fair 
is  held.  Sleek  Kling  priests  offer  you  tickets  which  are 
torn  out  of  a book  in  true  modern  style.  Holy  chupah 
food  and  sweetmeats  are  passed,  especially  during  the 
playing  of  music.  Incense  thickens  the  air,  but  does  not 
exclude  the  knowledge  of  fluttering  silks,  glances  of  dark 
eyes  and  the  clinking  of  jewelry  increasing  on  every  hand. 
Wood  fires  are  lit,  for  by  and  by  the  embers  are  to  take 
the  chief  place  in  the  orgy.  A pool  is  dug  and  filled 
with  imported  sacred  water  which  is  poured  from  kongs. 
The  devotees  begin  by  bowing,  crawling  in  the  dust,  and 
dragging  themselves  around  the  temple.  Stirred  by  their 
cries  of  fervor  and  pain,  the  excitement  grows,  until  it  is 
an  easy  thing  to  precipitate  the  crowd  into  a frenzy. 
Every  dark  eye  leaps  now  with  unmasked  fire,  and  every 
dark  skin  becomes  pallid;  the  clear-cut  consonants  of 
the  speech  are  chiseled  even  harder  by  the  gleaming  teeth 
which  crown  the  matted  beards.  Occasionally  there  is  a 
laugh,  not  of  ridicule,  but  of  tension  too  hard  to  control. 
As  the  crawlers  grow  exhausted  in  their  self-imposed 
penance  of  dragging  themselves  over  obstacles,  bearers 
step  forward  and  assist  them.  Word  is  passed  that  the 
first  who  fell  out  had  fasted  ten  days,  and  early  exhaus- 
tion is  taken  as  a proof  of  piety.  Saffron  robes  are  now 


44 


THE  CHINESE 


donned  by  the  remaining  performers;  more  priests  come 
forth  and  surround  the  gods.  Swords  are  drawn  and 
limes  are  cut  at  as  the  performers  turn  a double-somer- 
sault. A cocoanut  is  thrown  on  a brass  salver,  and  a somer- 
saulter  deftly  cuts  it  in  two  and  spills  the  libation  of  milk. 
The  first  of  the  exhausted  devotees  throws  up  his  arms; 
they  are  lashed  with  thongs.  Saffron  dust  is  thrown 
upon  those  who  endure,  and  they  are  considered  as  thus 
“ cleansed  of  sin.”  The  embers  of  the  fire  are  now  spread 
beyond  the  devotees,  and  the  gods  are  carried  across  the 
pool.  A white  goat  is  brought  before  the  idols  and  is 
beheaded.  By  this  time  the  devotees  are  in  a white  heat. 
They  are  loosed  by  the  priests;  they  rush  over  the  coals 
barefooted;  they  sweep  through  the  gushing  blood  of 
the  animal,  and  dash  into  the  pool,  after  which  devotees 
and  spectators  dance  around  the  idols,  the  whole  cere- 
mony concluding  by  everybody  taking  the  ashes  in  hand- 
fuls and  casting  them  into  the  air  and  over  themselves 
and  everybody  else.  The  Chinese  Taoists  of  Fu-kien  oc- 
casionally practise  a fire-walking  orgy. 

If  the  foreigner  is  a sportsman  who  prefers  less  dan- 
gerous explosives  than  Scotch-and-soda,  he  has  the  no- 
blest game  at  his  door,  for  tiger-shooting  is  possible  not 
far  from  Canton  and  is  abundant  in  the  long  fissures  in 
the  rocks  at  Amoy  and  Fu-chau.  The  natives  hunt  the 
animal  fearlessly  with  antique  weapons  and  home-made 
powder.  The  heart  of  the  beast  is  eaten,  as  it  is  esteemed 
to  be  a courage-producer.  The  claws  are  sent  to  Hong- 
Kong  to  be  mounted  in  twenty-carat  gold  and  sold  as 
charms.  The  skin,  which  is  finer  than  the  Indian  ani- 
mal’s, generally  finds  its  way  to  Russia. 

There  is  excellent  snipe-shooting  no  farther  away  from 
Hong-Kong  than  Castle  Peak  and  Deep  Bays,  along  the 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


45 


beaches  under  the  towering  brow  of  old  Tai  Mo,  the 
king  mountain  of  all  these  peaks  which  roof  you  daily, 
3640  feet  above  the  water  of  the  harbor.  The  favorite 
name  for  the  dominant  peak  of  whatsoever  range  is  Tai 
Lik  Shan  (hill  of  great  strength).  Walk  inland  a lit- 
tle way  along  the  raised  mud  path  between  the  rice  fields 
until  you  reach  the  clumps  of  banana  and  bamboo. 
There  you  will  find  surprisingly  good  shooting  of  wild 
pigeon,  ortolans  (rice  birds),  teal,  wild  goose,  partridge, 
and  noblest  of  all,  the  pheasant  in  his  habitat.  When 
our  forefathers  were  using  the  catapult  and  crossbow, 
the  Chinese  were  making  powder  on  the  following  form- 
ula, and  the  peasants  still  use  the  fizzing  stuff  within  spit- 
ting distance  of  the  tiger’s  teeth:  three  catties  (a  catty 
is  one  and  one-third  pounds)  of  ground  rattan  charcoal, 
the  expense  of  which  can  be  understood,  for  it  means  so 
many  baskets  destroyed ; three  catties  of  saltpetre ; ten  of 
sulphur;  all  wet  with  kaoliang  spirits,  and  stirred  to  a 
paste  over  a low  charcoal  fire,  and  afterward  dried  on 
paper  in  the  sun.  This  powder  of  course  dirties  the  gun 
barrels  abominably,  and  before  ignition  has  to  be  packed 
hard  with  the  ramrod.  In  Yunnan  (the  honey  land), 
tigers,  leopards,  wolves  and  even  elephants  afford  the 
king  sport  of  China  and  perhaps  of  the  world.  At 
Tientsin,  trained  eagles  are  used  to  hunt  pheasants  and 
hares. 

The  British  have  not  interfered  with  the  custom  of  pur- 
chasing servants,  or  technically,  slaves.  All  the  well-to- 
do  native  families  of  Hong-Kong  buy  at  Canton  girls  of 
eight  years  of  age  from  parents  who  have  been  reduced 
by  poverty  resulting  from  persecution  or  opium.  Nor 
has  the  government  with  whole  heart  and  open  eye  set 
itself  against  the  works  of  the  traffickers  in  the  souls  of 


46 


THE  CHINESE 


native  girls.  The  custom  is  only  rife  at  the  treaty  ports, 
where  the  foreigner  has  taught  the  wealthy  young  Chin- 
ese to  neglect  the  example  of  his  fathers  and  the  rules  of 
his  religion  which  prescribe  an  early  marriage.  The  pur- 
chase price  of  an  eight-year-old  slave  is  fifty  dollars ; of  a 
courtezan  slave  of  eighteen  years,  three  hundred  dollars. 
A deed  is  given  to  the  purchaser  and  the  parents  are  pro- 
hibited from  visiting  their  child.  The  idea  is  not  similar 
to  adopting  a daughter,  for  in  the  latter  case  no  deed  is 
signed.  Sometimes  in  extreme  want  due  to  famine,  the 
impoverished  one  will  engage  his  most  precious  posses- 
sion — his  son  — to  his  creditor  for  a stipulated  term  of 
service,  or  a ransom,  but  papers  must  be  signed  whereby 
the  creditor  assures  the  safe-keeping  of  the  child.  These 
things  shock  us,  but  suffering  has  worn  off  the  edge  of 
shame  in  the  minds  of  the  Chinese  poor.  The  act  is 
deemed  meritorious  in  the  victim,  who  serves  for  his 
parent’s  debt.  These  contracts  in  the  case  of  girls,  run 
from  the  eighth  to  the  eighteenth  year,  if  there  is  a saving 
clause  that  the  daughter  is  not  to  be  sold  into  prostitution, 
and  at  the  expiration,  the  parent  may  arrange  a marriage. 
But  if  the  clause  is  omitted,  the  child  may  be  sold  into 
shame  by  the  first  purchaser.  A promise  of  a change 
seems  to  light  the  horizon.  When  Chow  Fu  was  gov- 
ernor of  the  two  Kwang  Provinces  of  the  south,  he  rec- 
ommended to  the  throne  that  the  sale  of  girls  should  be 
prohibited,  and  an  Imperial  Rescript  was  issued.  The 
law  is  good  enough;  the  point  is,  will  it  be  enforced  by 
China  when  the  corrupt  parents  decide  to  succumb  to  the 
tinkle  of  the  silver  dollars  offered  by  the  depraved  of  a 
treaty  port? 

One  of  the  sights  of  crowded  Queen’s  Road  East, 
Hong-Kong,  is  the  itinerant  street  barber  at  work  on  the 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


47 


sidewalk,  under  the  immense  canvas  signs  of  the  tattoo- 
ers’  shops.  When  a customer  has  hailed  him,  the  barber 
simply  drops  his  mirror-bucket  and  basket  from  his  pole, 
and  he  is  at  once  set  up  in  business.  He  finishes  the  pro- 
cess by  shaving  the  inside  of  his  patron’s  ears  and  nos- 
trils, and  by  giving  the  eyeball  an  interior  massage, 
which  latter  fashion  accounts  for  the  prevalence  of 
trachoma.  A humorous  customer,  thinking  he  would 
reprimand  a careless  novice  who  was  shaving  the  inside 
of  his  right  ear,  asked : “ Are  you  at  my  left  ear  now  ? ” 
“ Why,  no,  I have  only  begun  on  the  right  ear ; why  did 
you  ask?  ” “ From  the  pain,  I thought  you  were  pass- 

ing to  the  left  ear  without  taking  the  trouble  to  go 
around.” 

Some  of  our  occidental  brokers  are  said  to  do  business 
in  their  hats,  but  the  Chinese  cobbler  does  his  in  his 
basket.  He  sits  on  the  road  and  hangs  a few  shoes  on 
a tripod  as  a sign.  The  repairs  consisting  of  pasting  and 
sewing  the  felt,  are  done  while  Chan  waits  goose-fashion 
on  one  leg. 

The  wealthy  Chinese  of  the  treaty  ports  have  taken 
joyfully  to  our  electric  (gasoline  being  prohibited  in  the 
tropical  south)  automobiles,  music-boxes  and  phono- 
graphs, and  if  the  last  named  plays  piccolo  or  violin  solos, 
it  will  hold  a crowd  of  thousands  of  natives  under  the 
window.  Hong-Kong  boasts  of  two  modern  jewelry 
shops,  one  kept  by  a German,  the  other  by  a Scotchman, 
where  the  finest  diamonds  are  on  sale.  The  Chinese  are 
developing  a connoisseur’s  liking  for  them.  Of  course 
pearls  have  always  been  their  prime  favorites.  Many  of 
the  Chinese  curio  stores  still  advertise : “ Kruger  sover- 
eigns on  sale.”  These  dull  gold  coins  were  brought  to 
the  Colony  by  the  transferred  battalions  of  the  Royal 


48 


THE  CHINESE 


Welsh  Fusiliers  and  Derbyshire  regiments  immediately 
after  the  South  African  war.  The  former  regiment  is 
humorously  remembered  in  Hong-Kong  by  the  black  tail 
which  hung  from  the  collars  of  the  tunics,  as  a relic  of 
the  regiment’s  mourning  when  wigs  were  taken  from  the 
troops.  The  Derbyshires,  perpetuating  the  times  and 
territory  of  Robin  Hood,  where  they  are  recruited, 
sported  a band  of  Lincoln  Green  on  their  forage  caps. 
Despite  the  fact  that  the  new  land  furnishes  them  the 
bread  which  the  old  land  was  unable  to  do,  the  Colonists 
have  not  brought  all  their  hearts  with  them,  and  find  in 
these  little  traits  of  the  troops  the  reminiscences  wLich 
“ drag  at  each  remove  a lengthening  chain.”  Tele- 
phones are  in  use  in  about  eighty  European  hongs.  The 
wires  must  be  nearly  worn  out  by  the  fokis  and  native 
office  boys  talking  to  their  friends.  When  office  hours 
are  over,  even  the  chair  coolies  come  in  to  learn  and  en- 
joy the  novelty,  which  they  utilize  at  the  top  of  their 
high  voices. 

The  newspapers  of  the  treaty  ports  are  generally  set 
up  by  Macaense  Portuguese  and  edited  by  Scotchmen. 
In  Hong-Kong,  a floating  dot  of  the  red  Empire,  some  of 
the  finest  leaders  in  our  language  are  prepared,  out  of 
pure  pride  in  the  profession,  for  the  circulation  of  the 
papers  is  not  large,  but  the  men  are.  Of  course  there  is 
no  rush,  as  in  New  York  or  London,  and  possibly  the 
heat  furnishes  (though  you  would  not  expect  it)  hot- 
house-growth to  some  of  the  finest  English  that  is  now 
being  written,  something  that  it  is  a pleasure  to  compare 
with  the  traditions  of  Addison’s  day.  Hong-Kong  is 
not  without  its  literary  records  and  is  boastful  of  those 
pealing  hymns  of  Christendom  which  Governor  Sir  John 
Bowring  wrote  under  these  frowning  heathen  hills : 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


49 


Watchman!  Tell  Us  of  the  Night,  and  In  the  Cross 
of  Christ  I Glory,  as  well  as  his  famous  literary  cameo 
on  Macao:  Gem  of  the  Orient  Earth  and  Open  Sea. 

China  proposes  that  her  Chili  Ming  Pu  (Board  of  Col- 
onies and  Censorship)  shall  pay  better  attention  to  the 
rapidly  increasing  number  of  Paos  (native  newspapers) 
which  employ  many  Japanese  in  editorial  positions,  and 
whose  bias  often  causes  worry  to  the  Manchu  policy  and 
dynasty.  “ Wo  sei  lai  liao  ” (the  Japs  are  coming)  — 
says  the  Board. 

What  a striking  change  has  for  the  time  being,  taken 
place  upon  the  once  embattled  waters  of  Hong-Kong 
since  the  Anglo-Japanese  Alliance  and  the  Anglo-Frank 
entente-cordiale!  Where  once  we  daily  looked  through 
our  blinds  upon  scores  of  battleships  like  the  Albion 
and  Glory;  four-funneled  flying  cruisers  such  as  the 
Leviathan  and  Crecy;  and  low,  swift,  narrow,  tel- 
escope-funneled  French  cruisers  of  valetir  Superieure 
like  the  old  favorites  Montcalnv  and  Gutchen,  now 
we  see  only  a few  river  gunboats  like  the  Moorhen 
of  two-foot  draft,  so  as  to  be  able  to  skim  the  creeks 
which  feed  the  Chukiang  and  feed  the  pirates  from  a 
four-inch  nozzle.  There  is  one  startling  and  epochal  ex- 
ception,— when  the  Japanese,  as  they  police  all  the  eastern 
waters  from  Singapore  to  Hakodate,  in  the  protection  of 
their  new  lines  of  commerce,  send  down  those  low  gray- 
ish-green gladiators  of  recent  fame,  the  Asama,  Nisshin 
and  Kasagi,  and  their  enrolled  captives,  the  Sagami, 
Tango  and  Iki,  whose  high  foreign  lines  show  that  they 
were  once  the  Peresviet,  Poltava  and  Nicolai,  which  ves- 
sels were  raised  from  an  average  depth  of  sixty  feet. 
America  alone  of  the  white  nations  has  maintained  battle- 
ships (at  present  two)  in  Chinese  waters  and  the  pros- 


50 


THE  CHINESE 


pective  increase  to  a much  larger  fleet  will  act  as  the 
best  salesman  for  American  goods.  In  the  franchises 
granted  by  their  Wai  Wu  Pu,  the  Chinese  reflect  the 
evidence  that  they  are  particularly  impressed  by  these 
demonstrations  of  the  white  powers,  and  England  and 
France  in  their  anxiety  to  strengthen  home  waters  politi- 
cally, have  in  China  lost  to  Japan  certain  ground  com- 
mercially by  this  action. 

In  a Chinese  cradle,  under  the  mysterious  yellow  robe, 
really  lies  the  commercial  future  of  the  Pacific  States  of 
America.  Shall  it  be  rocked  by  a faithful  hand,  made 
steadier  because  of  the  backing  of  a mighty  fleet,  or  shall 
the  nursling  be  tumbled  out  to  be  Ju-jitsued,  Bear- 
throttled,  or  Stein-smashed?  The  fleet  shall  say. 

The  Chinese  prophesy  the  political  union  of  America, 
England,  Canada  and  Australia,  with  America  the 
spokesman  of  the  union,  because  of  their  identity  in  Prot- 
estant religion,  speech  and  literature,  and  that  this  union 
can  alone  save  Australia  to  the  white  race  from  Japanese 
absorption. 

At  Hong-Kong,  blue  jays  and  magpies  (the  natives 
call  the  latter  hi  tsoih,  jolly  birds)  are  frequently  seen. 
The  magpies  mischievously  chase  the  golf  balls  along 
the  Happy  Valley  course.  During  the  rainy  season,  wag- 
tails visit  the  waterfalls  on  Bowen  Road,  and  when  the 
dry  season  comes  they  retreat  to  the  deep  stream  which 
runs  from  the  Peak  to  Aberdeen  at  the  back  of  the  is- 
land. Of  course  the  gorgeous  Yuen  Yang  (mandarin 
ducks)  are  in  their  habitat,  and  at  your  comprador’s 
home  you  will  find  specimens  in  his  courtyard  — not  his 
back  yard.  In  their  heraldry  surprisingly  tliis  bird  of 
gorgeous  plumage  has  to  be  satisfied  with  seventh  place. 
Justice  has  however  been  done  the  golden  pheasant, 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


51 


which  though  allowed  second  place,  really  holds  premier 
position,  as  the  fung-hwang  is  only  a mythical  phoenix. 

The  government’s  splendid  botanical  (they  almost  look 
like  hanging)  gardens,  set  upon  terraces  five  hundred  feet 
above  the  water  deserve  special  mention.  Tufted  Nor- 
folk pines  of  great  height  frame  the  view,  and  the  scene 
over  the  islands  and  blue  waters  is  unsurpassed.  As  one 
could  expect,  the  palm  section  is  as  royal  as  Cleopatra’s 
retreat  reset.  The  tea-flavoring  jasmines,  dahlias,  tube- 
roses, asters,  kosmos,  and  azaleas  give  this  land  the 
right  to  be  called  the  Eden  of  Flowers.  The  whole  prov- 
ince of  Kwangtung  is  a spangled  meadow  of  violets. 
The  climate  is  so  damp  that  no  glass  is  used  upon  the 
luxuriant  fern  house.  Merely  bamboo  wands  are  nailed 
on  the  roof  and  sides,  to  afford  a chequered  shade. 
Heart  of  all  the  bloom,  in  the  central  fountain  there  is  a 
glorious  display  of  purple  lotus  (Eichhornia  speciosa). 
Your  Yalensian  friend  (a  Chinese)  hands  you  the 
candied  root  and  bids  you  realize  Cleopatra’s  dream. 
While  you  have  been  talking  with  him  you  can  measure 
the  growth  of  that  most  exquisite  of  all  perfumed  flow- 
ers, the  Chinese  sacred  narcissus,  and  also  the  growth  of 
the  giant  bamboo.  Notable  among  the  flowering  trees 
are  the  purple  Bougainvillea  and  the  faithful  Bauhinia, 
which  latter  offers  you  garlands  when  all  else  of  nature 
sulks.  The  Hong-Kong  gardens  have  not  the  magnifi- 
cent Assam  rubber  trees,  spice  shrubs  and  other  exuberant 
growths  of  the  Peradeniya  Gardens  of  Cingalese  Kandy, 
or  rows  of  such  magnificent  waringen  trees  as  the 
Buitenzorg  Gardens  of  Batavia,  but  they  make  more  of 
what  they  have.  For  picturesque  setting,  there  is 
nothing  in  the  world  to  approach  them. 

Mouse  deer,  under  government  protection,  are  becom- 


52 


THE  CHINESE 


ing  so  numerous  in  the  Stanley  and  Taitam  Valleys  of  the 
island,  that  they  boldly  come  over  the  Wong  Nei  Chong 
Gap,  and  jump  the  blue  walls  of  the  Parsee  and  European 
cemeteries  on  the  Happy  Valley  Road,  and  do  great  dam- 
age to  trees  and  shrubs.  Lamps  have  been  tied  to  the 
swinging  branches  of  the  trees,  and  the  Chinese  of  the 
iWash-house  village  near-by  verily  believe  that  our  ghosts 
are  for  ever  unlaid,  and  it  takes  something  steadier  than 
the  Celtic  temperament  on  our  own  part  to  investigate 
the  uncanny  thing. 

As  clothes  are  never  put  on  a line,  but  on  the  lawn  in 
China,  the  long,  light  bamboo  pole  can  be  used  for  dark 
purposes.  It  is  affirmed  that  at  night,  flags  have  flut- 
tered over  one’s  wall,  and  in  the  morning  laundry  has 
been  missed.  So  often  has  this  occurred,  that  a native 
who  carries  at  twilight  a pole  with  a nail  in  the  end,  is 
arrested  as  a suspicious  person,  just  as  a lukong  would 
have  a right  to  gather  in  on  sight  a Chinese  whose  queue 
was  greased.  There  is  a custom  in  Hong-Kong  of  per- 
mitting coolies  to  sleep  on  one’s  doorstep  and  sidewalk, 
and  thieves  are  often  entertained  unawares  within  stalk- 
ing distance  of  their  snoring  victim. 

The  delightful  house-boat  trips  which  the  Shanghai 
sojourner  may  enjoy  on  the  Yangtze,  or  the  Soochow 
resident  on  the  Grand  Canal,  where  months  may  be  spent 
at  the  cost  of  one  dollar  a day  for  four  rowers,  are  denied 
to  the  resident  of  south  China,  for  the  romantic  West 
River  and  the  hundred  and  one  branches  between  the  Chu 
and  Sikiang  Rivers  are  poorly  policed,  and  subject  to 
piratical  attacks.  Not  since  the  rule  of  Li  Hung  Chang 
have  these  devious  waters  of  Kwangtung  Province  been 
safe,  and  how  often  have  we  of  the  south  sighed  for  a 
rule  such  as  the  mandarins  of  Hupeh  enforce  on  their 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


53 


waters.  However  in  moving  about  the  districts  or  Shens 
of  Kwangtung,  the  foreigner  does  not  experience  the  in- 
security which  is  felt  in  Fo-kien  and  Hunan  Provinces, 
whose  inhabitants  are  the  harshest  speaking,  roughest 
mannered  and  most  cruel  of  the  Chinese.  In  Kwang- 
tung we  were  terrorized  in  Shum’s  reign,  and  hope  soon 
gave  way  to  renewed  despair  when  Chow  Fu  succeeded 
him.  For  a while  the  British  gunboats  patrolled  the 
waters,  but  this  worked  Peking  and  the  more  advanced 
New  China  party  into  a turmoil,  and  then  Britain  with- 
drew. We  used  to  take  well-armed  tugs  and  make  the 
trips,  but  sleeping  over  the  boilers  in  the  tropical  night, 
with  its  sheets  of  hot  showers,  is  not  comfortable.  The 
house-boat  has  no  permanent  roof;  only  a bamboo 
support  over  which  mats  are  thrown,  whether  for  sun, 
rain,  dew  or  moon.  When  we  spoke  of  the  superstitions 
of  the  Taoist  priests,  the  Chinese  would  retort  that  our 
Jesuit  missionaries  always  called  for  the  mats  when  the 
moon  was  up.  I found  that  this  could  be  corroborated, 
even  among  the  Missiones  D’Etrangeres  men  in  Somali- 
land and  at  Aden.  Some  of  the  boats  are  nicely  carved 
and  lacquered,  but  for  your  peace  of  mind  they  will  be 
all  the  better  for  a simultaneous  and  reckless  attack  of 
buckets  of  water  and  soda. 

The  supply  of  milk  for  the  white  nmn’s  infants,  who 
have  only  one-tenth  of  a chance  for  life,  is  a matter  of 
great  concern  in  the  treaty  ports  of  the  Orient.  At 
Hong-Kong,  a small  herd  of  acclimated  American  cows 
are  kept  on  a comparatively  cool  plateau  twelve  hundred 
feet  above  the  sea,  in  cement  stalls,  and  grass-cutters  are 
sent  into  every  shady  nook  of  the  valley  and  behind  every 
gravestone  in  the  desperate  search  for  green  fodder,  wiry 
as  it  is.  The  value  of  the  cattle  is  enormous  because  of 


54 


THE  CHINESE 


the  frequent  raids  of  the  government  to  destroy  such  ani- 
mals as  have  developed  tuberculosis,  murrain,  anthrax, 
etc.  The  dairies  of  Spartan  Hong-Kong,  speaking  gen- 
erally, consist  of  a can  opener  and  your  selection  of  Swiss, 
Highland,  Dutch,  or  American  St.  Charles  labels,  accord- 
ing to  whichever  steamer  may  be  in  port. 

Where  the  eastern  seas  bubble  up  hot  to  the  flame  of 
an  equatorial  sun,  Chinese  workmen,  with  Scotch  over- 
seers, turn  out  six  thousand  ton  steel  ships  and  do  battle- 
ship repairing  worthy  of  Woolwich  or  Devonport.  The 
dividend  for  1907  was  twelve  per  cent,  after  writing  off 
for  depreciation  in  the  past  twenty  years  the  unnecessar- 
ily large  amount  of  two  million  dollars.  Hong-Kong 
possesses  on  the  mainland  at  Kowloon  and  Sham  Sui  Po, 
five  graving-docks  of  the  Hong-Kong  and  Whompoa 
Dock  Company,  which  concern  sixty  years  ago  moved 
from  Whompoa  Island,  near  Canton.  One  of  these 
docks  is  cut  six  hundred  and  fifty  feet  into  the  face  of  a 
towering  granite  hill.  With  all  the  exertion  of  the 
baronial  Mitsui  family  of  Nagasaki,  and  the  other  pri- 
vate shipyard  owners  of  Kobe  and  Yokohama,  assisted  by 
immense  subsidies  and  national  preference,  Japan  is 
still  behind  indefatigable  Scotch  Hong-Kong,  in  her 
maritime  product.  To  illustrate.  A bid  was  opened  at 
Manila  to  build  various  sea  tugs  and  launches.  The 
Uragu  Dock  Company  of  Japan  submitted,  for  a tug 
one  hundred  and  forty  feet  long,  twenty-six  feet  breadth, 
draft  thirteen  feet,  a price  of  $109,500.  The  Shanghai 
Dock  Company  bid  $105,376.  The  Hong-Kong  and 
Whompoa  bid  was  $86,280.  Situated  on  the  island  of 
Hong-Kong,  in  the  center  of  expensive  Victon'atown 
itself,  is  the  new  Naval  Yard  Extension,  where  a 
battle-ship  graving-dock  and  immense  tidal  basin,  impos- 


CO^RKSHT,  B'r 

Carrying  black  brick  tea  from  Yang-tze  river  boats  to  Tokmakoff 
Kussian  House."  Hankow.  Central  China.  River 
rises  40  feet  during  Spring  flooas. 


The  environs  of  Canton,  South  China.  The  einljrasnred  city  wall ; 
the  famous  " Five-story  Pagoda."  visited  hy  every  Ameri- 
can traveller  to  China;  the  treeless  hills  overrun 
hy  humankind  continuously  since  Xoah's  time. 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


55 


sible  to  be  reached  by  shell,  have  been  completed  in  re- 
claimed land.  At  Quarry  Bay,  five  miles  farther  east  on 
Hong-Kong  Island,  in  a position  however  that  can  be 
shelled  over  the  southern  hills  from  the  sea,  the  Butter- 
fields have  cut  in  the  rocky  shore  a dock  seven  hundred 
feet  long,  and  have  erected  repair  shops,  so  that,  at  the 
earth’s  extremity,  are  three  ship-building  and  dock  plants 
(one  government  and  two  private)  of  modern  equipment 
and  great  size.  In  addition  there  are  a number  of  Chin- 
ese plants  which  regularly  turn  out  ships  of  twelve  hun- 
dred tons  burden,  and  install  in  them  copies  of  European 
engines.  The  enforced  extension  of  official  Hong-Kong 
is  being  carried  on  by  expensive  reclamation  from  the 
sea,  on  a scale  which  is  equalled  at  no  port  in  the  world. 
The  money  is  provided  by  Parsees.  One  whole  praya, 
six  miles  in  extent,  is  thus  being  added  to  the  front  of 
the  island.  Across  the  harbor,  on  the  mainland  of  China, 
bays  are  being  filled  in,  so  as  to  afford  sites-  for  factories 
and  native  tenements,  for  surly  granite  nature  has  here 
turned  everything  on  edge  on  a more  gigantic  scale  than 
even  the  Titanic  upheavals  of  our  own  Greece.  By  this 
I mean  to  say  that  if  the  white  man  means  to  stay  in 
southern  China  he  must  build  for  himself  a foothold  from 
the  bottom  of  the  sea. 

Coal  is  brought  from  Wales  and  Australia  at  a cost  of 
six  dollars  gold  a ton,  and  stored  under  water  as  a re- 
serve for  the  Admiralty.  The  carbonic  dissemination 
from  the  piles  as  they  lie  exposed  to  tropic  rains  and  suns 
is  extravagant.  Kyushu  Island  in  Japan  mines  most  of 
the  commercial  coal  used  in  that  great  port,  though  it  is 
surprising  to  learn  that  India  sends  one  hundred  and 
thirty  thousand  tons  a year  of  her  Bengal  coal  to  Hong- 
Kong. 


56 


THE  CHINESE 


Just  before  your  ’rickisha  whirls  around  the  curve 
toward  the  saluting  battery  and  the  famous  Soldiers’  and 
Sailors’  blue  Canteen,  against  which  the  W.  C.  T.  U.’s  of 
England  wage  uncompromising  war,  look  up  Queen’s 
Road  Central  at  the  vast,  grotesque  canvas  sign  of  the 
King  of  Tattooers,  who  is  one  of  the  most  unique  char- 
acters a globe-trotter  comes  across.  He  boasts  that 
every  royal  traveler  who  has  come  to  the  east,  including 
the  Tsar,  has  “sought  the  charming  effects  of  his  ab- 
solutely fast  colors.” 

At  Hong-Kong  I brought  to  a native  shoemaker  on 
that  dizzy  old  Wellington  Road,  which  has  not  been  hol- 
lowed out  of  the  natural  hill,  a pair  of  low  shoes  to  copy. 
He  did  so,  but  finding  the  novelty  of  extension  soles,  he 
adopted  the  “ Melican  fashion  ” for  every  future  cus- 
tomer. When  the  British  complained  of  the  innovation 
he  gave  his  opinion  of  styles  as  follows : “I  sabee  you  no 
likee  now,  but  blymby  you  likee.”  Their  leather, 
which  is  tanned  in  gambier,  saltpetre  and  alum,  is  very 
tender  and  in  so  damp  a climate,  soon  gives  out.  The 
Chinese  tailors  on  Queen’s  and  Connaught  Roads  have 
progressed  a little  from  the  romantic  days  of  Perry,  and 
are  not  now  copying  the  “ bombardier’s  patches  and  all.” 
They  lay  the  tape  with  assuring  smiles  about  your  per- 
son and  call  out  Delphic  numbers,  but  the  result  still  looks 
grotesque.  Unless  you  watch  them  carefully  they  will 
run  around  the  hem  of  your  garment,  for  art’s  sake  pos- 
sibly, a thread  one  shade  lighter  than  the  cloth.  They 
are  a decided  failure  in  sponging  worsteds  and  tweeds 
which  they  import  from  England,  but  in  flannel  and  linen 
suits,  Ah-men-Hing-Cheong  and  Tak  Cheong  do  some 
passable  work,  as  well  as  in  the  hard,  wild  yellow  silk, 
called  “ tussah,”  which  is  the  product  of  worms  which 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


57 


feed  on  oak  and  ailantus  leaves  in  Shan-tung  Province. 
China  is  a pinless  country,  as  clothes  are  fastened  by 
holes  and  buttons,  or  loops  and  frogs. 

China  too  produces  its  gum-shoe  men  of  nocturnal 
prowlings.  It  was  the  hot  season  at  the  Hong-Kong 
Club,  every  roomer  sleeping  with  only  the  half  door 
closed.  The  electric  fans  worked  loud  enough  to  drown 
the  foot  of  a thief,  or  possibly  he  carried  a sleeping 
draft  in  his  handkerchief.  Into  six  rooms  he  crawled 
night  after  night.  He  doubtless  carried  the  long  Pun- 
jaub  knife.  Gold  studs  were  removed  from  shirts; 
watches  were  taken  from  under  pillows,  and  rings  from 
bureau  tops.  How  could  it  all  be  done  with  so  formid- 
able Sikh  chowkidars  on  guard  at  the  door  all  night! 
Weeks  went  by  and  there  was  no  trace.  The  Chinese 
bath  boys;  the  older  tea  boys;  every  one’s  private  boy, 
were  in  turn  marched  up  to  be  put  through  no  simple 
inquisition  of  “ Third  Degree  ” behind  the  stone  walls  at 
the  top  of  Wyndham  and  IMosque  Streets.  Then  Blass, 
who  was  on  a seven  year  indenture  in  the  East,  and  who 
was  a wonderful  fellow  scientifically,  remembered  that 
his  ring  had  a flaw  in  the  ruby.  It  is  a way  pigeon 
rubies  have  for  catching  thieves,  and  that  is  why  Burmans 
call  only  the  pink  gems  good  luck  stones.  The  pawn- 
shops were  again  searched,  even  to  distant  Yamati  on  the 
mainland.  The  ring  was  found,  but  horrors!  the  Chi- 
nese broker  attacked  our  faith  in  those  perfect  guardians 
of  our  eastern  homes,  the  Sikhs.  He  identified  one  of 
our  own  chozvkidars  as  the  guilty  party.  The  latter  con- 
fessed to  pounding  the  gold  to  bullion  and  throwing  the 
watch  works  in  the  harbor  from  a sampan.  He  also  said 
he  knew  why  he  could  safely  move  around  our  rooms,  but 
that  it  was  “ Indian  knowledge  ” which  he  would  never 


58 


THE  CHINESE 


betray.  Let  the  curious  therefore  debate  whether  it  was 
ether,  hypnotism  or  mere  luck  six  times  unbroken. 

Those  who  had  studs  stolen  were  of  no  use  as  witnesses, 
for  there  was  no  recovered  gold  to  identify,  but  Blass  was 
witness  enough,  and  the  Indian  got  as  fair  a trial  as  a 
white  man.  We  think  less  of  Sikhs  now,  but  Rasul 
Singh,  behind  the  jail  walls  on  Mosque  Street,  thinks 
more  of  us. 

Crews  for  all  trans-Pacific  ships  are  recruited  at 
PIong-Kong.  The  Chinese  of  Canton  is  the  best  disci- 
plined and  most  tractable  of  all  sailors.  He  never  rushes 
on  shore  to  get  drunk;  he  stands  without  flinching,  even 
better  than  an  Aden  Arab,  a heat  which,  south  of  Cancer, 
fries  the  pitch  out  of  the  deck  seams  and  the  marrow  out 
of  human  bones;  he  never  detains  the  vessel  after  its  sail- 
ing hour  because  he  is  lingering  ashore,  and  he  never  re- 
quires the  irons  to  be  clapped  on  him  at  sea.  If  he  goes 
crazy  he  goes  overboard  without  telling  you  of  it,  and 
killing  a man  on  the  way.  He  seldom  moves  his  bunk, 
signing  with  the  “ samee  olo  ship  ” year  after  year,  and  if 
he  does  leave  it  is  because  of  the  Confucian  law  requiring 
three  years  of  mourning  when  a parent  dies.  The  white 
mates  manage  the  sailors  through  a native  bo’sun  or 
“ Number  One  man.”  They  ask  only  one  privilege,  that 
of  gambling  with  their  returning  countrymen  who  have 
made  money  abroad,  and  tawny  Jack  never  fails  to  see 
that  his  landlubber  brethren  pay  due  toll  to  his  Neptunic  | 
lore.  All  the  way  across  the  calm  Pacific,  the  fo’c’s’l 
head,  and  the  battens  of  number  one  hold  are  checkered 
over  with  the  cards,  chips  and  cash  of  poker,  pai-lau,  fan-  | 
tan,  and  other  heathen  games.  When  the  typhoons  blow, 
or  when  life-boats  need  to  be  lowered  for  men  overboard, 
the  Chinese  act  with  such  coolness  that  one’s  confidence 


I 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


59 


in  them  is  established  at  once.  The  blue-gowned  wait- 
ers, with  their  long  queues  swinging  dangerously  near 
the  soup,  may  not  be  so  popular  with  the  traveler,  but  on 
deck  these  machine-like,  silent  workers  of  the  East  lend 
assurance  to  the  long,  tedious  voyage  of  twenty-eight 
days  across  the  Pacific,  when  one  takes  the  southern 
route. 

At  Hong-Kong  you  will  notice  that  when  the  ’tween 
deck  ports  are  thrown  open  to  the  stevedore’s  men  who 
come  alongside  to  take  delivery  of  the  quarter  sacks  of 
flour,  bamboo  sticks  are  used  in  the  tallying.  The  crim- 
inals among  them  must  twinge  when  they  recall  that 
these  are  the  same  tally  sticks  which  the  judge  at  Canton 
counts  out  and  throws  down  to  indicate  how  many  lashes 
the  culprit  shall  receive.  Not  a few  of  the  Hong-Kong 
laborers  are  deserters  from  justice  at  Canton. 

As  soon  as  a mail  steamer  arrives  in  the  busy  port, 
dozens  of  smoking  steam  launches  crowd  alongside,  and 
the  first  to  board  the  ship  are  the  native  boarding-house 
runners  from  Elgin  Street,  who  are  soliciting  returning 
Chinese  emigrants.  The  health  officer  is  helpless;  the 
emigrants  toss  ropes  over  to  the  launches  and  the  runners, 
with  the  agility  of  monkeys,  clamber  up  the  sides  of  the 
ships  and  over  the  bulwarks.  The  crews  look  like 
pirates;  they  are  half  naked.  On  their  wide  straw  sun 
hats  are  painted  the  names  of  the  houses,  so  that  the  emi- 
grants, looking  over  the  rail  on  the  scene  below,  may  be- 
hold the  merits  of  their  temporary  abiding  places  before 
returning  to  Canton  on  the  morrow.  Many  of  the 
signs  read:  “Fine  Gambling,”  “Auspicious  Welcome,” 
“ Heavenly  Thought,”  etc.,  the  philosophy  of  all  of  which 
the  fleeced  emigrant  will  probably  have  cause  to  recall  on 
the  morrow  eve.  When  the  steamboats,  such  as  those 


6o 


THE  CHINESE 


from  Canton,  berth  at  the  few  wharves  during  the  night, 
these  boarding-house  runners  carry  lanterns  with  the 
same  signs  emblazoned  on  them.  The  overturning  of 
one  of  these  lights  caused  the  great  steamer  Han-kau 
holocaust  in  the  early  morning  of  October  14th,  1906, 
when  four  hundred  Chinese  were  burned  to  death  in 
their  sleep,  and  a $300,000  cargo  of  silk  consumed. 

The  Chinese  Imperial  Customs  under  Sir  Robert  Hart 
and  Robert  Bredon,  Hong-Kong  and  even  Macao,  have 
done  something  to  light  the  ancient  coasts  of  south  China. 
As  the  exile  walks  along  Barker  Road  in  the  gathering 
dusk  toward  the  Wong  Nei  Chong  Gap,  he  beholds  Wag- 
lan  in  the  south,  flashing  out  an  intermittent  signal  but 
reminding  him  in  comparison  of  the  more  frequent  safety 
appliances  of  our  home  waters.  Looking  to  the  north,  a 
weird  sight  is  presented  in  fall  along  the  flanks  of  the 
mountains  which  frown  over  old  Kowloon  City,  Junk 
Bay,  Yamati  and  Hang  How  village,  and  the  Lyee-moon 
Pass,  which  shut  in  the  scene.  A low  running  fire  sets 
them  off  into  the  buttresses  and  towers  of  a heavenly  city. 
It  is  the  grass-cutters,  who  are  thus  fertilizing  their 
mountain  pastures  of  wire  grass.  The  hills  are  composed 
of  a progressively  disintegrating  granite,  which  supports 
only  a coarse  grass  which  kills  sheep,  but  the  natives  use 
it  for  pig  fodder,  fuel  for  kindling  and  for  vase  kilns, 
fertilizer,  baskets  and  bedding.  The  tremendous  rains 
wash  away  into  the  crevices  even  what  little  loam  does 
accumulate.  The  Hakka  grass-cutters  are  a fiery  lot,  and 
the  government  has  been  slow  to  step  in  and  prevent  the 
destruction  of  the  imported  Scotch  fir  growth  which 
would  in  time  reclothe  the  denuded  hills. 

The  Colony  is  visited  often  by  the  enlightened  native 
lady,  Mrs.  Wu,  wife  of  the  famous  minister  Wu  Ting 


FOREIGNERS  IN,  CHINA  6i 

Fang,  and  sister  of  the  eminent  Doctor  Ho  Kai  of  Hong- 
Kong,  who  is  a colonial  legislator  Westminster  would  be 
proud  of  for  his  attainments  and  zeal.  It  will  be  recalled 
that  Minister  Wu  years  ago  practised  as  a barrister  before 
the  British  courts  of  Hong-Kong,  where  he  was  born. 
His  wife,  so  beautiful  in  her  quiet  and  sweet  dignity  to 
every  one  who  saw  her  in  the  Colony  and  on  shipboard, 
has  shown  that  high  thoughts  and  i.  great  heart  throb 
behind  her  unassuming  mood,  or  is  concealment  the  won- 
derful way  of  a Celestial?  She  has  given  Hong-Kong 
a great  hospital,  called  the  Ho  Min  Ling,  for  the  women 
of  her  race.  Government  provided  the  site.  Already  a 
native  hospital  existed  in  the  Tung  Wah,  whose  officials 
surprise  foreigners  with  the  avidity  with  which  they  send 
for  the  bones  or  bodies  of  even  the  obscurest  Chinese  emi- 
grants who  die  at  sea.  “ Prince  or  pauper,  he  is  a Chin- 
ese, and  the  same  worship  is  paid  him  by  a loyal  son.” 
There  are  besides,  the  large  Civil,  Military  and  Naval 
Hospitals,  and  the  private  Peak  Hospital,  but  all  are  not 
too  many  for  this  tropical  station  of  sickness  where  fevers 
fight  for  ever  under  their  yellow  banner  of  “ No  Surren- 
der.” 

Old  Kowloon  City,  (whose  translated  name  is  “Nine 
Dragons,”  owing  to  the  nine  overhanging  peaks)’  across 
from  Hong-Kong,  is  beginning  to  draw  the  feet  of  anti- 
quarians. There  is,  of  course,  nothing  like  the  higher, 
wider  scene  which  appals  the  ordinary  imagination  in 
the  north,  where  the  Great  Wall  climbs  peaks  five  thou- 
sand two  hundred  feet  over  one’s  head.  The  wall  of 
the  ancient  city  of  Kowloon  clambers  between  the  boul- 
ders of  the  valleys  and  over  several  hills  three  hundred 
feet  high,  which  were  encircled  and  used  as  redoubts. 
The  wall  between  the  angles  uses  more  stone  than  appears 


62 


THE  CHINESE 


in  the  construction  of  the  Great  Wall  in  many  places. 
These  Hakkas  evidently  did  not  believe  in  jerry  contrac- 
tors, when  the  safety  of  their  city  was  to  be  tested.  The 
guns  have  been  dismantled  and  cast  about  the  ramparts 
by  the  British  with  the  same  intent  that  induced  the  As- 
syrians to  sow  salt  and  tares  in  the  fields  of  those  whom 
they  had  conquered  in  citadels  but  were  not  so  sure  they 
had  conquered  in  spirit.  On  the  way  from  the  shore  set- 
tlements to  both  old  Kowloon  and  Yamati,  the  govern- 
ment has  cut  some  remarkable  roads  through  the  yellow 
loess.  It  packs  well,  and  if  you  did  not  test  the  walls, 
you  would  conclude  on  sight  that  it  was  an  engineering 
work  which  had  cost  millions.  With  what  a feeling  of 
security  once  on  one  of  these  night  walks  above  the  native 
settlement  of  Elang  How,  we  came  across  a British  cor- 
poral’s guard  stationed  by  a four-point-seven  gun  on 
the  dark  road ! Hundreds  of  coolies  had  dragged  it  part 
of  the  way  up  in  the  daytime,  but  it  was  too  valuable  a 
government  pet, — this  pointer-nosed  beauty, — to  be  left 
unguarded,  out  in  this  picturesque  southern  China,  where 
the  white  man,  while  he  talks  mannerly  to  his  yellow 
neighbor,  still  keeps  his  powder  dry. 

As  the  curio-hunter  saunters  into  Kruse’s,  or  Kuhn 
and  Komor’s,  Hong-Kong,  a creepy  feeling  possesses  him, 
in  his  illegal  search  after  hara-kiri  swords,  scimitars  from 
Borneo,  and  dahs  and  krises  from  Java,  that  a Sikh  po- 
liceman is  watching  him  with  hypnotic  eye  through  the 
windows,  to  see  if  the  store  is  selling  swords  in  a colony 
where  arms  are  interdicted  because  of  the  overwhelming 
native  population. 

When  the  hot  summer  swoops  down  upon  Peking,  the 
foreign  resident  goes  to  the  cooler  hills  of  Patachu, 
twelve  miles  away,  and  the  residents  of  Kobe,  Yokohama 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA  63 

and  Seoul  have  relief  within  a few  hours.  Think  of  a 
commitment  for  a seven  years  indenture  to  an  island, 
where  only  three  places  (and  those  water  level),  can  be 
reached  over  Sunday.  This  is  the  experience  of  most  of 
the  Anglo-Saxons  who  contract  for  service  at  Hong- 
Kong.  Canton,  once  known  by  the  Joshuan  name  of 
Yang  Ching  (city  of  rams),  affords  the  longest  trip. 
This  is  the  city  of  the  empire  where  it  is  said  every  new 
thing  and  luxury  germinates;  where  excitement  always 
runs  high  and  box-top  orators  abound ; where  the  myrmi- 
dons of  tax  farmers  flourish,  and  if  it  does  not  equal  Nan- 
king in  literary  culture,  it  is  the  Athens  of  China  in  con- 
ceit, and  the  Paris  or  Kyoto  of  China  in  art  productions. 
Take  lots  of  money,  for  the  stores  will  tempt  the  tightest 
fist.  The  boat  sails  from  Hong-Kong  at  eight-thirty 
A.M.,  before  foreign  life  is  astir,  but  long  after  the  alert 
Chinese  have  opened  the  day  with  firing  of  crackers  and 
burning  of  joss  paper  on  the  high  sterns  of  their  junks. 
The  wharf  shed  on  the  Praya  is  about  the  loudest  in  de- 
sign that  can  be  imagined,  and  would  frighten  any  Ostend 
resort  of  the  most  bizarre  aspirations.  But  once  aboard 
the  modern  boats  Fatshan  and  Honam,  one  is  de- 
lighted that  the  comforts  of  a Boston  steamer  are  af- 
forded in  so  remote  a country,  with  the  additional  unique 
feature  of  armed  Sikhs  patrolling  the  hatches.  The  first 
part  of  the  trip  is  in  landlocked  British  waters,  frowned 
over  by  lofty  Victoria,  Castle  and  Tai  Mo  Peaks.  Many 
islands,  some  of  historic  interest  in  the  annals  of  Euro- 
pean commerce  with  the  Orient,  dot  the  stream.  Half 
of  the  native  names  have  happily  been  retained.  Shek 
Wan  Pen  is  contiguous  to  Deep  Water  Bay,  and  Castle 
Peaks  overlook  Cap  Sui  Moon  Pass.  First  comes  Stone- 
cutter’s Island  and  then  Mah  Wan  Island.  It  is  alto- 


64 


THE  CHINESE 


gether  captivating  when  the  captain  mixes  his  new-found 
learning  of  the  east  with  your  old  world  names.  Little 
white  villages  of  stone  are  scattered  as  far  up  the  great 
peaks  as  terraces  can  be  cut  to  support  life,  and  the  foot- 
hills look  like  patterns  in  plaids  with  the  varied  green 
of  the  small  garden  patches  which  are  unbroken  by  fences. 
Melancholy  Lintin  Island  is  passed,  with  not  a house  or 
tree,  and  only  a few  cellars  remaining  on  it.  Who  would 
believe  that  in  1830  it  was  covered  with  the  stores  and 
homes  of  men  of  our  race?  Great  bays  five  miles  deep, 
open  up,  and  the  receding  tide  uncovers  to  the  waders 
edible  seaweed,  shell-fish  and  eels.  Bloated  bodies  and 
heads  bald  in  front  drift  by,  carrying  tales  of  the  mur- 
dered and  the  beheaded,  and  the  tails  of  the  men  them- 
selves in  the  former  case, — the  terribleness  both  of  dis- 
order and  order  in  uncanny  company.  When  you  are 
half-way  to  Canton,  the  estuary  narrows  to  the  Bocca 
Tigris  (Tiger’s  Mouth  in  Portuguese).  All  about  are 
rice  fields,  banana  plantations,  and  plots  where  the  canabis 
sinensis  is  cultivated  for  the  famous  buff  and  blue  grass- 
cloth.  A thousand  canals  communicate  with  the  East 
and  West  Rivers,  the  most  of  them  extending  from  the 
central  Pearl  River  to  the  West  River.  Many  of  them 
are  navigable  for  the  tugs  one  finds  in  Hong-Kong 
waters,  and  I recall  some  keen  experiences  when  we  fol- 
lowed in  the  wake  of  the  government  cruiser  which  was 
catching  pirates,  and  tossing  their  heads  into  baskets  on 
the  top  of  bamboo  poles,  as  a deterrent  of  crime.  Soon 
we  pass  Whompoa,  where  the  first  foreign  dock  was  lo- 
cated, and  where  Russell’s  famous  American  tea-clippers 
used  to  drop  anchor.  Whompoa  will  come  into  its  own 
again  and  make  PIong-Kong  tremble  because  of  a rival 
greatness. 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


65 


Then  Canton  the  ancient  and  wonderful,  Canton  the 
brains  of  China,  comes  into  view.  The  wharf  is  in  the 
old  city,  and  it  is  necessary  to  take  a dirty  sampan  to 
reach  the  European’s  island  of  Shameen  (literally  “ sand 
face”  because  of  its  beach).  Across  a dirty  canal,  the 
Sha  Kee  Street  of  the  native  city  faces  you  with  its 
myriad  signs.  The  government  proposes  to  reclaim  land 
in  the  canal,  so  as  to  make  this  street  two  dietings  (thirty 
feet)  wide, — something  very  lavish  for  South  China. 
Everywhere  the  boat  population  surges  on  the  waters, 
probably  three  hundred  thousand  people  thus  finding  a 
home  along  the  famous  Pagoda  anchorage.  What  a con- 
tretemps! two  marble  Gothic  shafts  of  the  French  Cathe- 
dral, where  the  French  and  Belgian  priests  officiate,  robed 
in  Chinese  costume,  spring  from  amid  the  low  wilderness 
of  tile  roofs.  The  only  other  tall  objects  are  the  square, 
unwindowed  pawn  shops;  a pagoda  or  two  outside  the 
walls;  the  towers  for  detecting  fires,  and  a smooth  Mos- 
lem minaret,  one  hundred  and  eighty  feet  high,  which 
has  stood  for  five  hundred  years.  The  temples  are  only 
two  stories  high,  and  are  hid  away  among  the  squat 
houses.  In  the  zigzag  streets,  made  so  for  defense 
against  pirates,  and  also  devils  who  can  not  turn  a corner, 
with  their  many  steps  (for  the  Great  Wall  set  the  prece- 
dent that  grading  should  never  be  done)  a guide  is  in- 
dispensable. They  wait  for  you  under  the  palms  at  the 
beautiful  Victoria  Hotel  at  Shameen.  One  dollar  Mexi- 
can silver  a day  is  the  fee.  Your  chair  with  four  bearers 
costs  one  dollar  more,  and  one  dollar  will  pay  all  fees  for 
bonzes  who  admit  you  to  their  temples. 

The  city  has  a market  history  since  the  eighth  century, 
and  is  easily  the  premier  city  of  China.  It  decidedly  is 
the  metropolis  of  the  country,  as  New  York  is  with  us, 


66 


THE  CHINESE 


and  it  may  eventually  be  the  capital  if  the  Manchus  are 
overthrown. 

How  many  places  there  are  to  go;  the  shops  of  those 
who  inlay  silver  with  kingfishers’  feathers,  whose  work 
each  day  brings  them  that  much  nearer  to  blindness;  the 
Chy  Loong  ginger  works,  which  have  candied  sweet- 
roots  for  you  and  me  since  we  were  boys;  the  Tung  Shing 
sandalwood  and  ivory  carvers;  the  shops  of  the  jadestone 
polishers;  the  Chun  Loong  matting  works;  the  shops 
where  artists  paint  on  ivory  and  rice  paper;  the  Yan  Kee 
tea  burners’  works ; the  Edible  Birds’  Nest  market ; silk  and 
embroidery  shops  on  Sai  Loy  Street;  the  fragrant  cam- 
phor-wood coffifi  shops  just  beneath  the  Tartar  wall, 
where  the  horsemen  ride  with  panoply  of  antediluvian 
war;  the  venerable  Water  Clock  dripping  down  the  mo- 
ments of  centuries  which  knew  not  our  white-men’s  poli- 
tics ; the  lazy  beggars  on  the  steps  who  do  not  even  ask  an 
alms,  but  trust  to  their  professional  distortions  and  their 
hypnotic  eyes  to  attract  pity.  The  less  said  about  the 
gaudy  Hwa  Ting  or  Flower  Boats,  and  the  fan-tan 
shops,  with  their  huge  lanterns  along  the  Chung  Sun 
Street  in  the  western  suburb,  the  better.  There  are  tea- 
houses, like  so  much  driftwood,  on  the  water’s  edge,  with 
some  loose  life,  bad  music  and  gorgeous  robes.  A meal 
there  of  rice,  cabbage,  pork  and  bean  fixings  costs  tho 
dandy  three  and  a half  cents.  Signs  of  the  Crescent  here 
and  there  show  where  Mohammedans  have  their  bath- 
houses. 

The  Hwang  Han  Temple  is  remarkable  for  its  ex- 
pansive tile  roof  and  two  miniature  pagodas  in  the  great 
stone  courtyard.  Not  much  can  be  said  for  the  Em- 
peror’s Temple,  which  is  taudry  and  modern  in  style. 
He  never  visits  these  temples,  and  the  citizens  therefore 


'FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


67 


spend  only  enough  money  on  him  to  conform  with  tlie 
law,  which  prescribes  a place  in  each  of  the  provincial 
capitals  for  the  Emperor  to  worship  the  One  God.  In 
the  Fa-ti  Gardens,  clipped  chrysanthemums  wear  porce- 
lain heads  and  hands. 

The  little  ancestral  chapel  of  the  Tsang  Clan  is  alto- 
gether delightful,  from  an  architectural  point  of  view 
particularly,  and  partly  from  a sociological  considera- 
tion. Two  great  beacons  of  three  tiers  flank  it.  The 
railings,  friezes,  grilles,  eaves,  the  ridge  ornament  par- 
ticularly, and  the  wing  chapels  are  as  delicate  as  the  best 
occidental  taste  could  prescribe.  The  modern  ancestral 
temple  of  the  Chun  Ka  Che  clan,  outside  the  walls,  is 
more  elaborate  and  the  costliest  in  China.  This  is  the 
part  of  the  country  where  a merchant  prince  dares  laugh 
at  the  idea  that  the  throne  may  not  be  vied  with  in  osten- 
tation. The  fretwork  of  the  balcony  exhibits  the  richest 
specimens  of  carving.  The  general  chasteness  of  line 
found  throughout  China  is  here  lost  in  too  much  deco- 
ration. ^ 

The  Temple  of  the  Five  Genii  on  Great  Market  Street 
has  a beauty  of  pillar,  a lightness  in  poise  of  double  roofs, 
and  a length  of  vista  through  the  halls,  that  appeal  to  the 
imagination  instantly.  There  is  little  carving  and  you 
desire  none.  You  have  found  what  only  genius  can  con- 
ceive, proportion,  and  it  is  no  more  plentiful  in  China 
than  in  other  lands.  The  Buddhist  monks  have  set  out 
royal  palms  on  the  terraces  to  fit  into  the  general  scheme 
of  columns  approaching  the  cloisters,  and  the  illusion 
that  Nature  built  the  temple  easily  ensues.  A balustrade 
with  pink  tile  frettings,  completes  a picture  of  line  and 
light,  so  that  it  is  hard  to  say  whether  etcher  or  painter 
would  best  essay  it. 


68 


THE  CHINESE 


The  curious  can  go  to  the  Nam  Hoi  Magistrates’ 
Yamen,  where  the  prisoners  are  on  view  in  cangues  and 
chains  and  the  unconscionable  rascals  are  the  only  Chinese 
who  like  to  be  photographed.  The  Green  Tea  and  the 
Swatow  are  the  best  known  of  the  Guild  Halls.  Even 
the  beggars  here  have  their  Guild  Hall.  An  amusing 
advertisement  of  one  of  the  Canton  hotels  confesses  the 
more  of  the  general  conditions : “ This  hotel  is  entirely 
free  from  obnoxious  odors.”  The  rent  of  the  best  shops 
is  low  enough,  but  tens  of  thousands  prefer  to  carry  their 
shops  on  a bamboo  over  their  shoulders.  A Canton  adage 
needs  no  explanation : “ Get  rich  with  a taxless  basket, 

for  the  tax-gatherer  sucks  a shop  as  dry  as  an  empty 
shell.”  The  hucksters  can  not  carry  signs,  so  they 
yell  their  wares,  each  in  the  note  of  his  Guild.  The  bar- 
ber’s note  is  like  a cicada’s;  the  cobbler’s  like  a cat’s; 
while  the  umbrella  man  storms  like  our  Themistocles 
when  he  roared  above  the  fleets  of  Salamis.  I think  a 
Chinese  has  the  shrillest  and  strongest  voice  in  the  world, 
and  can  make  the  wryest  face  in  ejecting  it.  But  he  is 
quite  capable  of  exhibiting  the  most  infectious  smile  at  the 
first  sight  of  humor.  He  shows  all  the  indications  of  a 
healthy,  well-poised  mentality.  Two  chair-bearers, 
jostled  into  by  two  coolies  who  are  carrying  a great  load 
between  them  on  a bamboo,  shout  back  most  filthy  lan- 
guage concerning  the  mothers  of  t^eir  assailants.  Noth- 
ing daunted,  the  latter  retort:  “Mo  mi  ma  zvo  peen” 

(Go  on,  you  tailless  horses),  which  is  the  most  insulting 
name  a draft  coolie  can  be  called,  and  a trail  of  laughter 
follows  in  the  wake  of  the  jeered.  Everybody  else,  in 
the  height  of  manners,  is  extending  the  usual  morning 
greeting,  “ chih  kwo  fan”  (have  you  had  rice),  which 
answers  to  our  “ how-do-you-do  ” salutation.  The 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


69 


peddlers  are  in  force;  they  chiefly  visit  the  homes  of 
foreigners  with  tlieir  baskets  of  porcelain,  jewels,  silks, 
furs,  and  jade.  We  remember  one  of  the  wiliest  who 
used  to  bring  white  fox  furs  which  we  suspected  had  lain 
too  long  in  the  pawn  shops,  until  the  fur  was  molting, 
for  they  have  no  cold  storage  system  in  the  south  of  the 
empire.  He  would  leap  like  a jumping-jack  and  vo- 
ciferate: “ No  slake  (examine)  ’em  first;  you  makee  buy, 
then  can  look  see,”  which  was  all  too  good  for  himself. 

The  umbrella  mender;  the  cutter  of  wood  seals  or 
“ chops  ” ; the  itinerant  banker  with  his  strings  of  cash, 
the  load  under  which  he  was  groaning  probably  not  being 
worth  over  six  of  our  dollars;  the  shoe-man  shouting 
“ straw  sandals  one  cent  a pair ; ” the  leaping  or  yellow 
cookie  man,  for  they  keep  in  China  the  yellow  of  their 
eggs  while  they  send  us  the  albumen  in  crystals;  the 
dentist  with  his  pincers  and  a string  of  his  horrible  con- 
quests; the  medicine  seller  with  his  dried  snakes;  the 
seller  of  che  (sticks  of  sugar  cane  one  foot  long), — all 
hurry  along  with  an  eye  searching  one  way,  and  a voice 
the  other,  for  “good  luck  pidgin,”  or  the  first  bargain  of 
the  morning.  A guided  company  of  the  blind  in  Indian 
file,  with  their  hands  on  one  another’s  shoulders,  pass  near 
the  wall  and  murmur  “ kou  lun"  (for  pity’s  sake,  a 
gift!).  The  streets  are  so  narrow  and  sunless  with  signs 
that  the  lantern-maker,  the  fish-man,  the  dyer,  and  the 
housewife  all  dry  their  wares  on  the  tile  roof,  where 
possibly  a small  tree  may  be  growing  in  the  ancient  col- 
lection of  dust  in  the  gutterway  and  spout.  The  fruit 
vender  will  not  sell  you  the  orange  with  the  skin.  He 
sells  the  skins  separately  as  a flavoring  for  boiled  rice  or 
for  preserving.  The  professional  story-tellers  gather 
crowds  as  dirty  sugar  gathers  flies.  If  you  listen  you 


70 


THE  CHINESE 


will  conclude  that  the  reciters  have  memorized  from  un- 
expurgated editions  of  popular  novelettes,  and  also  added 
a dressing  of  their  own.  The  lantern  and  balloon  seller 
is  in  tremendous  difficulties,  and  has  the  pain  of  Atlas 
on  his  brow  and  shoulders,  for  while  his  long  pole  lifts 
his  wares  above  the  crowds,  it  is  for  ever  bumping  into 
the  forest  of  street  signs.  Here  is  a fresh-faced  country 
boy  carrying  his  baskets  of  water-cress.  His  feet  are 
covered  with  sores,  for  the  water  where  he  works  is  none 
too  pure.  There  goes  a band  of  strolling  musicians,  out 
to  earn  a day’s  honest  wage,  blowing  furiously  on  sangs, 
scraping  on  tikins,  picking  at  pipas  and  banging  at  los. 
A barber,  when  he  has  nailed  a customer,  backs  up  to  the 
wall,  for  “ if  cutee,  no  payee.”  Every  one  else  traffics 
in  the  jostling  crowd.  Look!  there  steps  a mandarin 
from  his  chair  toward  the  Yamen’s  steps.  He  affects  a 
walk  with  feet  set  very  far  apart,  just  such  as  you  see 
copied  by  a certain  class  of  the  jeunesse  of  the  army  as 
they  take  an  airing  down  the  platform  at  the  Horse  Guards 
Parade  Ground,  London,  or  at  our  own  Presidio;  it  was 
learned  in  China! 

One  never  sees  fisticuffs.  Now  and  then  an  urchin 
spits  at  a foreigner’s  chair  and  shouts.  Fan  kivei  lai 
(See,  here’s  a foreign  devil),  but  his  ears  are  cuffed  by 
the  first  shopkeeper  who  can  reach  him,  especially  if  the 
American  monitor  Monadnock;  the  British  gunboats 
Algerine  and  Moorhen,  or  the  French  Styx  are  in 
port.  Coal  bearers,  corpse  carriers,  idol  bearers,  all 
join  the  rout  of  the  barefooted,  but  outside  of  their 
voices  these  millions  pass  in  silence  along  their  smokeless 
streets;  no  wheels,  no  hoofs,  no  bells,  no  whistles,  no 
leather  shoes.  What  a difference  between  the  street 
scenes  here  and  in  Peking,  the  capital  of  the  north!  In 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


71 


Canton,  the  capital  of  the  south,  there  are  no  animals  or 
carts  in  the  narrow  streets.  In  Peking  the  most  striking 
features  of  the  street  life  are  the  trains  of  double-humped 
Bactrian  camels  and  the  springless  Peking  passenger  carts 
in  the  wide  streets.  Step  ten  paces  off  the  street  in 
Canton  into  the  first  temple  court,  like  the  Hwang  Hau, 
and  the  hush  of  the  longest  recorded  centuries  of  this, 
our  poor  earth,  immediately  closes  about  you,  as  though 
your  soul  had  dropped  into  space.  You  who  have  never 
thought  before  in  your  own  land  of  excitement  and 
danger  on  the  streets,  suddenly  are  awed  in  this  exile 
among  the  heathen  by  your  own  mind  turning  about, 
facing  you  and  saying:  “ We  never  met  before.”  This  is 
what  you  will  never  forget.  This  is  what  you  can  truly 
say  for  ever : “ I discovered  my  identity ; I accepted  my 
responsibility  in  fear  in  China.” 

Who  are  these  little  Cantonese?  Up  the  Fu-kien 
pirate  coast;  up  the  scented  Yangtze;  up  the  shadowy  Si 
River;  along  the  marshes  of  Malaysia,  or  under  the  iron 
cliff's  of  Liaotung,  always  keeping  within  sound  of  the 
thud-thud  of  the  screws  of  British  gunboats,  has  followed 
the  greatest  abettor  of  British  power  and  British  prints, 
the  peerless  Cantonese  middleman,  the  real  civilizer  of 
the  East. 

The  second  excursion  is  to  Macao,  of  which  we  will 
relate  separately,  and  the  third  and  last  trip  available  to 
a Hong-Kongite  is  that  up  the  West  River  (Sikiang). 
The  sternwheel  boats  Sainam  and  Nanning  leave 
Canton  for  Woochow,  two  hundred  and  twenty  miles 
away,  three  times  a week,  making  the  journey  in  thirty 
hours.  The  river  was  opened  to  foreign  trade  as  far 
back  as  1897,  but  its  beauties  are  only  lately  coming  into 
fame  with  us.  The  Chinese  have  always  appreciated 


72 


THE  CHINESE 


them,  but  this  is  not  the  only  thing  we  have  learned  they 
have  been  concealing.  “ Concealment  is  Nature’s  first 
measure  of  safety,  and  half  of  a man’s  wisdom,”  says 
their  proverb.  Where  the  North  River  and  Fatshan 
Branch  join  the  West  River  at  Sam  Shui  (Three  Wat- 
ers), which  you  easily  mispronounce  and  say  “ whisky” 
in  Chinese,  the  most  beautifully  wooded  headlands  reach 
into  the  water.  It  might  from  all  natural  appearances 
be  a bend  in  the  Ottawa.  Stone  temples  peep  from  be- 
neath the  trees  and  you  conclude  that  the  Chinese,  who 
do  everything  opposite  to  us,  do  not  place  their  best  archi- 
tectural creations  in  cities,  but  on  hills,  in  woods,  or 
beside  the  waters,  so  that  beauteous  Nature  may  be  a 
propitiator  between  God  and  man,  for  they  say  true  love- 
liness and  sin  can  not  exist  together.  As  you  sail  into 
the  broad  waters  of  Woochow  reach,  and  the  moon  comes 
over  Pagoda  Hill,  and  glistens  on  the  porcelain  tower, 
you  have  something  lovely  to  remember  for  ever,  and  con- 
clude that  a country  can  be  beautiful  and  a man  patriotic 
in  any  language. 

One  of  the  stops  is  called  Do-Shing,  and  you  wonder 
whether  you  are  in  Devonshire  or  along  the  Danube,  until 
you  separate  the  name.  Do  — Shing.  There  is  no 
journey  equal  to  the  first  part  of  this  trip  in  affording 
opportunity  to  study  Chinese  life,  for  the  villages  crowd 
to  the  water’s  edge.  The  Hudson,  or  the  Danube  at  the 
Iron  Gate,  can  not  surpass  Shui  Hing  Gorge,  with  the 
Marble  Mountains,  Seven  Star  Hills,  and  How  Lek 
Peaks,  and  their  many  pagodas  towering  over  the  water, 
which  is  swollen  with  the  summer’s  torrents.  At  Kam- 
chuk  the  rapids  run  twenty  miles  an  hour.  The  river  is 
more  picturesque  than  the  Hudson  because  of  its  greater 
number  of  bends.  One  seems  to  be  sailing  into  a wall, 


One  of  the  three  most  beautiful  pagodas  in  China.The  octagonal 
■■  Flower  Pagoda,”  Canton.  looo  A.D.  Native  house 
of  tile,  stone,  brick  and  cement  such  as  built 
in  South  China  in  foreground. 


CO^OICMT.  »»0*.  TmC  BOftRS 

Cargo  junks  and  small  residence  boats,  where  hundreds  of  thousands 
of  people  live,  Pearl  River,  Canton,  South  China. 


I 

i 

i 


COPVHK-,MT  (MR.  TM(  COWP«»v 


'I'he  Old  and  the  \ew — modern  steamboat  brought  in  sections 
from  Scotland,  anchored  among  the  sli])per  boats  and 
sam|)ans  of  Canton,  South  China. 


FOREIGNERS  IN  CHINA 


73 


when  suddenly  a new  reach  is  spread  before  the  view, 
with  banks  where  sorghum,  indigo,  cassia,  mulberry,  tea, 
banana,  ramie,  matting  reeds,  palm  and  bamboo  grow  in 
varied  colored  luxuriance,  not  to  speak  of  fields  of  that 
most  quiet  of  all  green  shades  of  nature,  where  the  rice 
and  millet  patches  extend.  Now  the  stream  narrows  to 
a gorge,  and  the  mountains  again  come  to  the  water’s 
edge,  and  during  the  torrential  rains  of  summer  the  bare 
hills  present  thousands  of  glorious  waterfalls.  Then  a 
turn  is  made,  and  a lake  covered  with  boat  life  extends 
wdde  into  the  fields.  A pagoda’s  thin  shadow  spears  the 
waters.  Great  junk  sails  seem  to  be  moving  through  the 
gardens,  along  hidden  creeks,  of  course.  Not  all  the 
ports  which  you  pass  on  the  river  can  be  touched  at,  be- 
cause they  have  not  been  opened  by  treaty,  and  the  in- 
terdiction lends  zest  to  the  trip.  Now  and  then  a raft  of 
the  precious  giant  bamboo  is  towed  past  by  launches. 
Along  the  Teng  Yu  Mountains,  w^ater falls  glisten.  De- 
cidedly the  most  unique  sight  on  Chinese  waters  is  a 
native  passenger  boat,  with  the  great  sw^eeps  and  sails, 
working  its  crowded  human  freight  up  the  stream.  A 
first-class  ticket  costs  one-half  of  a cent  a mile.  There 
is  no  steward’s  service,  for  every  man  eats  from  his  own 
lunch  basket,  or  rather,  handkerchief.  At  Kamchuk  and 
Shui  Hing,  the  old  capital  of  the  province,  buildings  en- 
croach into  the  stream  on  piles.  A Chinese  seems  never 
to  be  afraid  of  water  or  freshets,  though  floods,  typhoons, 
clumsy  junks,  and  frail  sampans  are  for  ever  taking  a 
terrible  toll  of  death  among  this  persistent,  patient  race. 
Along  the  tow  path  on  the  right  of  the  stream,  human 
trackers  pull  freight  boats  against  the  current.  Tak 
Hing,  on  the  north  bank,  shipped  you  the  matting  w'hich 
is  laid  on  the  bedroom  floor  of  your  far  distant  home. 


74 


THE  CHINESE 


The  marshes,  where  the  reed  grows,  extend  far  inland. 
Since  you  have  at  last  made  a call  upon  them  where  they 
were  working  with  a will  for  you,  you  will  doubtless  now 
and  for  ever  have  a new  heart  for  the  little  saffron 
brothers  who  are  knee  deep  in  the  water,  whose  wage  is 
twelve  cents  a day,  and  who,  after  paying  their  living 
expenses,  have  as  a profit  on  what  they  sell  you,  only  two 
cents  a day  left  to  save. 


II 


THE  PORTUGUESE  AND  CAMOENS  IN  CHINA 

When  Luther,  iVVoIsey  and  the  Pope  were  the  names 
that  clamored  loudest  in  the  world,  a few  swarthy  Lusi- 
tanian  adventurers  in  half-decked  caravels,  had  taken  so 
long  a journey  that  the  fame  and  luxuries  of  the  old 
world  were  of  small  import  to  them  in  their  remotest 
exile.  From  the  yellow  Tagus  and  Lisbon  they  had  come 
to  the  red  delta  of  the  Canton  Ri\  er,  in  China.  The  col- 
ony exists  to-day,  and  I found  the  dried-leaf  charm  of 
the  dim  past  clinging  to  the  yellow  and  blue  chunam 
(stucco)  walls  of  sunny  INIacao.  The  dangers  of  the  past 
are  also  a present  reality  on  these,  the  most  dangerous 
waters  of  the  world,  from  a police  standpoint.  A river 
trip  is  spiced  with  the  risk  of  piratical  attacks.  The 
creeks  and  upper  reaches  of  the  delta,  between  the  Chu 
and  Sikiang  Rivers  give  refuge  to  nearly  naked  and 
bronzed  bucaneers,  who  frequently  fire  from  the  sorghum 
brakes  upon  passing  steamboats.  xA.ll  the  native  junks 
which  ply  on  the  WTst  River  to  the  silk  plantations,  are 
equipped  with  cannon  of  antique  pattern,  and  hand- 
grenades. 

The  handsomest  steamboat  east  of  Suez,  the  Heimg- 
shan,  leaves  Hong-Kong  for  ]\Iacao  at  two  o’clock,  ar- 
riving at  sundown.  The  trip  is  to  the  mouth  of  the 
Pearl  River,  and  across  more  open  water  than  the  voyage 
to  Canton.  Differing  from  Chinese  and  mediaeval  cities, 
for  in  the  spirit  of  the  latter  it  was  partly  planned,  Macao, 

75 


76 


THE  CHINESE 


filling  up  the  end  of  a narrow-necked  peninsula,  is  walled 
only  on  two  sides,  the  north  and  the  south.  The  sea 
itself,  providing  the  moat  on  the  east  and  west,  has  al- 
ways proved  to  be  the  stronger  barrier.  The  Chinese  at 
will  have  leaped  the  Porta  Cerco  wall,  but  on  many  oc- 
casions the  Macaense  prevented  the  landing  of  the  Dutch 
along  the  eastern  beach  by  the  guns  of  Bomparto,  Fran- 
cisco and  Guia  forts.  The  city’s  incorporated  name  is 
“ Cidade  da  Nome  de  Deos,  Nao  ha  outra  mais  leal  ” : 
“ City  of  the  Name  of  God,  most  loyal  of  the  Colonies,” 
which  honor  was  accorded  it  by  Dom  Joa  IV.,  in  1642. 
The  Boa  Vista  is  a castle-like  hotel  on  the  Penha  Heights, 
which  overlooks  the  sixteenth  century  Bomparto  fort  and 
the  great  half  moon  Praya  Grande  bay.  It  is  the  most 
picturesquely  situated  and  cleanest  hotel  in  the  Orient, 
and  has  been  a source  of  national  jealousy  between  Portu- 
gal, France,  China  and  England.  France  has  been  en- 
deavoring to  secure  it  as  an  advance  post  toward  Canton, 
for  if  England  ever  takes  the  Yangtze  basin,  France  is 
going  to  demand  the  whole  coast  from  Tonquin  to 
Fu-kien,  including  the  two  Kwang  Provinces  and  Yun- 
nan, to  the  capital  of  which  she  is  now  sending  a railway 
from  Haiphong.  The  Boa  Vista’s  fish  and  game  dinners 
are  famous  throughout  the  East.  It  also  makes  a spe- 
cialty of  Portuguese  wines,  from  the  light  Colares  to 
golden  port.  The  drive  from  the  band  gardens  along  the 
cliffs  to  the  Areia  Preta  bathing  beach  rivals  Hong- 
Kong’s  noble  Jubilee  Road,  and  both  of  these  oriental 
roads,  hanging  over  the  sea,  surpass  Nice’s  Corniche 
Road  in  foliage  and  color.  Through  the  productive,  in- 
tensively-developed Chinese  truck-farms  runs  the  wide 
Avenida  Vasco  da  Gama,  as  far  as  Mongha  Fort.  Over 
Cacilhas  Bay  is  the  picturesque  Montanha  Russa  Park, 


THE  PORTUGUESE  AND  CAMOENS  77 


which  is  graded  like  a grassy  volcano.  All  were  built  by 
chained  convict  and  impressed  soldier  labor.  Few  now 
frequent  these  noble,  highly  maintained  roads,  as  the 
courtly  dark  Macaenses  have  drifted  to  Hong-Kong  to 
earn  a livelihood,  and  the  historic  little  colony,  Europe’s 
first  conquest  in  Cathay,  is  lapsing  into  merely  a sanita- 
rium and  pleasure  resort,  from  which  place  neither  Manila’s 
Baguio  or  Hong-Kong’s  peak  promise  to  displace  it. 
Macao’s  unique  feature  in  this  respect  is  the  steady- 
blowing through  the  hot  months  of  the  sou-west  monsoon. 
Should  this  breeze  lapse  for  a moment,  death  would  come 
to  thousands  from  the  awful  heat  resulting.  As  you  look 
at  night  from  the  wide  verandas  of  the  Boa  Vista  hotel, 
you  notice  lights  like  fireflies  flitting  along  the  Praya 
Grande.  They  are  the  lanterns  of  the  few  who  must  be 
abroad  late,  or  of  adventurers  who  are  returning  from 
the  fan-tan  gambling-houses.  The  lukongs  will  challenge 
none  who  bears  a light.  In  all  oriental  cities  there  are 
more  private  watchmen  than  police. 

The  hospitality  of  the  Macaense  is  proverbial.  Their 
table  conspicuously  displays  the  influence  the  Chinese 
have  had  upon  them  during  four  centuries:  candy  fla- 
vored with  arbutus  and  haw  seeds ; laoping  pasties  made 
of  water  chestnuts  and  flour  and  colored  the  popular 
citron  yellow;  coagulated  duck’s  blood  pudding;  bamboo 
shoots  preserved  in  sugar;  and  carambola  and  mango 
jellies.  As  butter  is  scarce,  you  can  taste  the  sesamum 
oil  in  food. 

A visit  to  the  opium  farm,  as  you  drive  up  the  tortu- 
ous Rua  da  Penha,  affords  a curiosity.  The  lane  which 
runs  along  the  low,  dreary  factory  smells  of  the  narcotic 
fumes,  and  not  a green  blade  grows.  Look  through  the 
bars.  They  are  boiling,  stirring  and  straining  the  balls 


78 


THE  CHINESE 


from  India,  which  they  have  mixed  with  the  lower  grade 
pods  from  their  own  Yunnan  fields,  in  brass  dishes,  till 
finished  like  brown  treacle  the  mixture  is  poured  into 
water-buffalo  horn  cups.  These  cups  are  incased  in  tin, 
and  again  in  camphor-wood.  There  is  a great  park-like, 
stone-paved  court  attached  to  the  factory,  but  none  save 
an  Occidental  is  ever  seen  in  it.  The  factory  boys  are 
more  stupefied  for  sleep  than  play,  after  their  work.  All 
the  opium  brought  to  America  is  made  at  this  farm. 
The  ships  lie  twenty  miles  away,  just  off  the  edge  of  the 
smuggling  shallows,  at  the  famous  Ko who w- Yang  an- 
chorage, where  arms  are  dealt  in  at  night  over  the  sides 
of  phantom  ships,  for  pirates  and  the  Young  China  party. 
Old-fashioned  Portuguese  gunboats,  like  the  Diu  and 
Goa,  with  low  waists  and  high  bulwarks,  and  Arm- 
strong guns  on  wooden  carriages  lashed  to  the  deck, 
escort  the  prize-laden,  high-sterned  junks  from  the 
crowded  inner  anchorage  to  the  mail  steamers.  I once 
returned  on  the  gunboat  with  the  tanned  Legionaires 
of  the  romantic  little  kingdom.  The  men  could  recite 
the  epic  of  Camoens  with  that  pathos  which  is  possible 
only  by  those  who  have  a proud  past,  but  no  possible 
future.  The  shippers  of  the  opium  are  quite  justified  in 
their  fears  that  pirates  may  dash  out  for  the  million-dollar 
cargo  from  behind  Taipa,  Don  Joao  or  Lapa  Islands. 

Lonely  Portugal,  the  relict  of  a great  race,  sits  in  her 
ancient  palace  surrounded  by  portraits  of  a famous  past. 
The  names  she  whispers  in  her  melancholy  are  Da  Gama, 
who  gave  the  world  the  sea-link  to  India;  Prince  Henry 
the  navigator,  who  suggested  to  Columbus  his  ambitions; 
and  Camoens,  who  was  the  Chaucer  of  the  Portuguese 
language,  and  one  of  literature’s  five  great  epic  writers. 
He  was  the  greatest  genius  of  Portugal,  versed  in  the 


Oldest  ruin  (1594  A.D. ) of  European  association  in  China,  faqade 
of  San  Paulo  Cathedral.  i\Iacao.  The  Chinese  classic, 

" Ming-  Shi."  lauds  the  architecture.  Quaint  bronze 
statues  were  cast  at  Bocarro's  gun  foundry 
at  Macao  in  i6th  century. 


COf^HlCMT,  I9M,  TMl  ■OBkS  MtHRIU.  COWPAhV 


Macao,  looking  from  Penha  Height  to  Cape  Sao  Francisco.  Famous 
Praya  Crande  drive  facing  water;  Guia  liglithouse  in  riglit 
distance,  and  Monte  Fort  in  left  distance,  both 
first  of  their  kind  in  China. 


COPVRIOHT,  t*M.  TMl  W MtRRUl  COMPANY 


Macao,  looking  from  Cai>e  Sao  h'rancisco  to  Penha  Heights. 
Hotel  “Boa  \'ista  " in  distance. 


THE  PORTUGUESE  AND  CAMOENS  79 


classics  like  Milton,  a warrior  of  Sydney’s  stamp,  a 
dashing  courtier,  and  a traveler  of  Cervantes’  wit. 
Portugal  may  be  notable  again,  when  Brazil,  her  off- 
spring by  blood  and  literature,  dominates  in  South 
America.  She  exists  to-day  as  a tragically  discontented 
decadence  in  Europe;  a sunny  spot  in  China;  a group 
of  forsaken  cathedrals  on  the  Malabar  Coast,  and  a neg- 
lected blur  of  uninhabited  territory  under  the  blue- 
and-white  flag-of-the-castles,  in  Africa. 

Half-way  between  Hong-Kong  and  Canton,  on  a nar- 
row peninsula  of  canal-veined  Heang-Shan  district  of 
Kwangtung  Province,  between  the  Pearl  River  and  the 
sea,  is  the  settlement  of  Macao,  holding  in  its  arms,  to- 
ward the  cool  sou-west  monsoon  a flashing  blue  bay, 
which  dashes  its  waters  over  the  long  walls  of  the  circling 
Praya  Grande.  It  is  the  Naples  of  the  Orient  in  appear- 
ance, color,  joy  and  carelessness.  Here  in  1557  came 
Camoens,  a political  exile,  and  here  he  wrote  half  of  The 
Lusiad,  thus  producing  in  China  a supreme  work  of 
European  literature,  in  days  when  the  American  hemi- 
sphere loomed  like  cliffs  of  wonder  in  the  uncertain  mists 
of  early  discovery,  and  when  the  morning  star  of  Shakes- 
peare had  not  yet  risen  on  the  minds  of  mankind. 
Camoens’  luxuriant  garden  and  grotto  overlook  the 
inner  and  outer  harbors,  which  were  covered  in  his  day, 
as  on  the  golden  afternoon  when  I saw  them  first,  with  a 
forest  of  yellow  and  brown  matting  sails  of  junks.  Little, 
however,  was  the  poet’s  heart  fed  by  the  argosies  of 
silver,  golden  brocades,  ivory,  pearls,  porcelain,  camphor, 
and  silk,  passing  homeward  to  his  cruel  Lisbon.  He  was 
weaving  another  web,  and  his  heart,  bitter  in  exile,  was 
wounded  to  produce  the  poetic  pearls  of  a second 
Odyssey. 


8o 


THE  CHINESE 


Blue,  yellow,  red  and  brown,  the  squat  buildings  of 
Macao  crowd  on  rising,  uneven  ground,  and  present,  with 
their  roofs  of  heavy  tiles,  a color  scheme  worthy  of  the 
brush  of  Velasquez.  The  streets  run  a zigzag  course, 
so  that  from  house  to  house  defense  could  be  made 
against  the  Chinese,  or  against  the  Dutch  in  the  later 
days  of  the  Colony.  These  houses  are  popular  with  the 
Chinese,  whose  superstition  it  is  that  a devil  can  not  turn 
a corner.  The  shutters  of  the  buildings  have  fish-scale 
and  pearl-shell  windows,  which  soften  in  the  rooms  the 
intense  light  of  an  oriental  day.  High  against  the  sky- 
line is  the  distinguishing  ruin  of  Macao,  the  windowless 
Renaissance  fagade  of  the  burned  San  Paulo  Cathedral, 
with  its  three  rows  of  Corinthian  pillars,  superimposed 
on  ten  Ionic  pillars.  The  antique  edifice  was  erected  early 
in  the  sixteenth  century.  The  magnificent  flight  of  one 
hundred  stone  steps,  as  wide  as  the  edifice  itself,  is  bound 
by  Time’s  hand  in  plumes  of  grass  and  bright  oriental 
blooms,  and  the  night  alone  swings  lamps  of  worship 
over  the  old  roofless  altar  of  four  centuries  ago.  In  the 
Se  Cathedral  I heard  a military  mass,  reminiscent  of  the 
cavalcades  of  Da  Gama  and  Cortez,  the  host  being  sa- 
luted with  presented  swords.  The  Miserere  of  Gounod 
was  played  by  a military  brass  band  in  the  church  loft. 
Little  swarthy  soldiers,  uniformed  in  blue,  swung  along 
the  dazzling  streets  to  a march  played  by  the  bugle. 
They  wore  rimless  caps,  these  reckless  ones,  suited  more 
for  the  Estrella  Mountains  of  their  homeland  than  the 
pitiless  suns  of  the  East,  but  with  the  impulsive  Latins, 
as  with  the  Chinese,  appearance  and  old  customs  must 
never  be  sacrificed  for  a mere  thing  like  climate. 

The  government  ration  to  the  soldiers  included  good 
Colares  wine,  poured  desecratingly  from  a tin  pail  into 


THE  PORTUGUESE  AND  CAMOENS  8i 


pewter  cups.  The  native-born  Portuguese,  called  Maca- 
ense,  dress  in  contradistinction  to  the  usual  oriental  cus- 
tom, in  black,  which  uncomfortably  attracts  the  actinic 
rays  of  the  sun.  The  small  ruling  class  from  Lisbon 
seems  out  of  place  in  the  exotic  gowns  of  European 
fashion.  The  Chinese  shuffle  along  the  excellent  concrete 
military  roads  in  their  gorgeous  blouses  of  purple,  yel- 
low and  blue,  and  they  look  to  the  manor  born.  They 
gather  in  knots  before  the  wax-model  and  lantern  stores  on 
bright  Rua  Felicidade,  and  discuss  progress  in  the  ear  of 
the  unprogressive.  The  blue-and-white  barred  turbans,  with 
long  streamers  attached,  of  the  imported  Sikh  police  make 
the  most  attractive  head-gear  one  could  see  the  world 
over.  The  sound  of  clanking  chains  approaches  along 
the  road,  and  a band  of  native  prisoners,  linked  together, 
who  have  been  working  on  the  highway,  are  escorted  by. 

Filled  with  the  piety  of  Xavier,  and  following  his  steps 
on  the  same  sunny  roads,  the  little  Colony  is  most  charac- 
teristically solemn  and  impressive  in  its  Santa  Croce 
procession  in  June,  which  reminds  one  of  the  Paso  pro- 
cessions of  Seville.  The  Legionaires  are  as  disciplinary 
as  the  soldiers  of  Da  Gama ; they  compel  the  Protestant 
stranger  at  the  points  of  their  swords  to  remove  his  hat. 
The  music  is  doleful  and  fitful  sobs  fill  its  pauses.  The 
procession  is  slow  and  halting;  its  color  is  black  where 
the  small  number  of  Europeans  and  Macaense  lead,  and 
purple  where  the  long  line  of  Chinese  converts  follow. 
Down  the  Rua  da  Se,  named  from  the  yellow,  Spanish- 
style  cathedral  at  its  head,  it  winds  to  the  Praya  Grande 
which  skirts  the  ocean.  Camellias,  carnations  and  leaves 
are  scattered  at  the  nine  street  stations  of  the  Cross. 
Two  children  robed  in  white,  and  winged  as  Raphaelic 
cherubs,  lead  and  regulate  the  kneeling  and  the  march. 


82 


THE  CHINESE 


The  whole  Colony  is  out  upon  the  harbor  street;  the 
women  veiled  behind  their  Do  cloths  are  in  the  windows 
of  the  single  line  of  houses  which  face  the  bay;  the  rest 
of  the  city  is  deserted.  The  Chinese  come  to  wonder 
especially  at  the  gaily  dressed  band  of  converts  who  are 
nearly  all  girl  slaves  who  were  purchased  in  childhood. 
The  Casa  Misericordia,  the  Church  Lottery,  is  strongly 
represented  by  liveried  officials.  Finally  a heroic-sized 
figure  of  Christ,  bearing  His  cross,  is  brought  forward 
upon  the  shoulders  of  the  troops.  The  flare  of  the 
trumpets  assails  the  heathen  air;  the  draped  drums  roll 
out  the  gathering  thunder;  the  emotion  of  the  onlookers 
contributes  sobs,  and  the  little  band  of  Catholic  exiles 
take  every  thrill  of  courage  possible  out  of  their  famous 
fete.  High  above  the  Areia  Preta  Beach,  behind  the 
square  walls  of  the  Protestant  cemetery  which  is  smoth- 
ered in  a vast  foliage,  lies  the  body  of  Robert  Morrison, 
the  pioneer  Protestant  missionary  and  translator,  whose 
name  is  at  last  coming  into  its  own  in  a great  fame,  now 
that  the  Christian  scriptures  are  leavening  China. 

On  the  fifth  day  of  the  fifth  moon,  the  Chinese  hold 
their  religious  procession  of  Ken  Yuen,  their  greatest 
democrat  whom  they  have  canonized,  which  ceremony, 
however,  takes  place  on  the  water,  and  the  Macaense  be- 
come the  spectators.  Flimsy  bamboo  stands,  bound  to- 
gether with  rattan  only,  are  erected,  and  their  not 
infrequent  precipitation  in  the  excitement  causes  vast  loss 
of  life.  The  island  communities  of  Taipa,  Joao,  Lapa 
and  Heungshan  send  boats,  very  like  our  war  canoes, 
only  that  the  bow  and  stern  are  carved  into  the  form  of 
a dragon.  The  ceremony  includes  the  casting  of  gifts 
and  sacrifices  into  the  water,  which  was  copied  by  the 
Venetian  doges  when  they  heard  the  tales  which  Marco 


THE  PORTUGUESE  AND  CAMOENS  83 


Polo  brought  home.  The  festival  closes  with  racing  on 
a vast  scale.  The  boats  are  all  overmanned,  sometimes 
with  sixty  paddlers,  and  the  gunwales  are  often  only  five 
inches  above  the  choppy  water.  A platform  is  raised  in 
the  waist,  on  which  stands  a naked  man  who  beats  the 
stroke  on  a gong  for  his  bareback  crew.  Native  women 
are,  of  course,  kept  at  home.  In  the  exciting  finish  I 
have  seen  the  stroke  raised  to  seventy-five.  The  irregu- 
larity of  the  paddling  as  much  as  the  collisions  is  respon- 
sible for  the  swampings.  The  whole  world  has  leaped 
in  alarm  when  telegrams  have  come  from  Yuet  Shing  on 
the  Kau  Kwan  reach  of  the  West  River,  of  the  loss  of  one 
thousand  lives  through  the  tumbling  of  one  of  the  stands 
during  the  wild  finish  of  the  races  there.  After  the 
races,  the  boats  paddle  to  all  the  villages  of  the  sea 
delta.  Wafted  into  your  room  on  the  Penha  Height  at 
Macao  by  the  sou-west  monsoon,  far  into  the  night,  like 
the  classic  echoes  of  the  strokes  of  Jason’s  crew,  come  the 
sounds  of  the  gongs  and  the  paddles  of  these  dusky  boat- 
men as  they  visit  and  challenge  for  the  morrow  among 
the  bays  of  Taipa  and  Joao., 

Once  a month,  on  a Sunday,  crowds  from  Hong-Kong 
repair  to  Macao,  to  a classic  little  building  with  white 
barred  windows,  on  the  Rua  da  Se,  to  witness  the  draw- 
ings of  the  Misericordia  Lottery,  which  is  the  most  ex- 
tensive in  the  East  and  has  given  Macao  the  name  of  the 
oriental  Monte  Carlo.  The  officers  are  in  uniform  and 
have  just  come  from  special  benediction  for  the  drawing, 
and  mass  in  the  Se  Cathedral  close  by.  Inside  a railing 
the  costumed  committee  sit,  with  a smile  upon  their 
countenances,  which  is  half  between  the  cupidity  of  a 
gambler  and  the  satisfaction  of  a virtuous  judge.  A 
trumpet  is  blown  for  eclat.  Around  goes  the  great  brass 


84 


THE  CHINESE 


globe,  while  every  breath  is  held.  The  dice-like  number, 
which  falls  out  only  one  at  a time,  is  passed  to  three  per- 
sons, two  of  whom  witness  the  number,  and  the  last  steps 
forward  and  theatrically  announces  it  to  the  assemblage 
beyond  the  rails.  This  lottery  draws  from  Manila  three 
hundred  thousand  pesos  annually;  from  Hong- Kong  six 
hundred  thousand  dollars,  Mexican.  For  its  franchise  it 
is  compelled  to  maintain  Macaense  charities,  including  a 
college  named  for  St.  Joseph,  under  the  direction  of  the 
church;  hence  the  religious  name  of  the  lottery.  It  also 
pays  a heavy  tax  to  the  “ Governmento  Leal,”  half  of  which 
assists  to  maintain  the  fine  local  roads;  a quarter  goes 
home  to  Portugal  to  be  lost  in  the  aristocratic  halls  of 
the  white  Ajuda  palace  on  the  cliffs  of  Belem;  and  a 
quarter  helps  to  support  the  poorer  Portuguese  colony  of 
Timor  near  Sumatra.  In  comparison  with  this  lottery 
the  largest  bank  of  Macao,  the  Po  Hang,  hides  its  dimin- 
ished head. 

In  the  arch  of  the  half  moon  bay  at  Macao,  between 
the  forts  of  Bomparto  and  Francisco,  just  before  you 
turn  up  the  street  by  the  park  where  the  Portuguese  bands 
play  on  Sunday  afternoons,  you  will  notice  an  unusual 
house  for  the  East.  It  faces  the  purple  bay  where  the 
fishing  junks  are  drying  their  brown  nets  on  yellow  main- 
sails. The  windows  are  of  imported  stained  glass,  and 
the  grilles  are  painted  white.  It  is  the  only  house  you 
have  ever  seen  in  China  where  the  blue  stucco  is  not 
scaling  or  lichening  like  an  architectural  leper.  You  are 
told  the  owner  is  a rich  Chinese,  or  a Tsai-shu,  and  that 
his  country  place  is  among  the  Heungshan  Hills  where 
he  was  born  in  poverty,  ten  miles  away  on  execrable 
roads,  which  pass  through  acres  of  graves,  underneath 
wonderful  tamarind  trees,  and  past  the  golf  course  of 


THE  PORTUGUESE  AND  CAMOENS  85 


the  navy  and  outdoor  staff  of  the  Imperial  Customs  Serv- 
ice, where  the  holes  are  earthen  cups  hammered  into  the 
stony  hillside.  I took  a ’rickisha,  with  two  pushmen  and 
made  the  trip,  which  is  one  of  as  many  ups  and  downs  as 
a Gulf  Stream  passage  when  the  wind  is  against  the  tide. 
It  w'ould  have  been  better  to  have  taken  a barrow,  espe- 
cially between  Passalcao  and  Chinsan.  At  the  Porta  da 
Cerco,  where  the  soldiers  are  drinking  imported  Colares 
wine,  and  lolling  under  the  trees,  you  leave  Portuguese 
territory,  and  enter  old  China.  The  truck  gardens  smell 
noisome,  but  are  luxuriant  in  appearance.  The  chow 
dogs  are  barking  like  a side-battery.  The  tillers  never 
leave  their  fields  to  look  at  you,  a Fung  Kwei,  and  the 
coolie,  though  weighted  with  two  heavy  pails  hanging 
from  a bamboo  borne  upon  his  bare  shoulders,  steps  off 
the  road  into  the  swamp  to  let  you  pass,  but  he  does  not 
look  up.  The  manners  of  China,  by  the  Tao  Li  code,  are 
self-effasive.  At  the  outskirts  of  a village,  you  come  to 
the  country  seat.  Hand-cut  granite  walls  inclose  a lawn 
where  horned  black  water-buffalo  feed.  The  tea-house 
at  the  gate  is  open  for  you  to  step  in  and  rest.  You  pass 
through  doors  which  are  always  open,  to  the  rock  garden, 
the  lily  pools,  the  fir  forest,  and  the  flat  gardens  of  clipped 
chrysanthemums  nearer  the  house.  Cool  stone  seats  are 
everywhere,  roofed  over  to  hold  off  the  great  sun.  The 
master  sends  you  tea,  even  though  you  have  not  sent  in 
your  card,  you  being  only  a hurried  foreign  visitor  of  no 
significance,  who  has  heard  that  his  grounds  are  open 
to  every  one.  In  our  land  the  seat  would  cost  a million. 
There  is  not  an  establishment  in  the  village  worth  twenty 
dollars,  but  the  religion  of  China  requires  that  a man  shall 
return  to  his  birthplace.  The  remarkable  man  whose 
homes  these  were,  died  at  the  Praya  Grande  house  in 


86 


THE  CHINESE 


September,  1906.  His  name  was  Ah  Fong,  and  he  had 
been  living  in  retirement  for  fifteen  years  with  his  homely 
village  relatives.  Forty  years  previous  he  emigrated  to 
Honolulu,  where  he  amassed  millions  in  sugar  and  labor 
contracting.  He  married  there  a half  white  and  half 
Kanaka  woman,  by  whom  he  had  thirteen  daughters  and 
two  sons.  When  he  left  Honolulu  he  gave  his  wife  and 
daughters,  who  did  not  want  to  go  to  China,  one  million 
dollars.  One  of  the  daughters  married  an  admiral  in 
the  United  States  navy,  and  the  others  made  marriages 
with  white  men  of  some  prominence  in  the  territory.  Ah 
Fong  brought  his  son  Anthony  to  China,  and  to  him  he 
has  left  the  greater  part  of  this  romantic  fortune  on  the 
stipulation  that  he  shall  follow  the  religion  and  patriotic 
teachings  of  Confucius.  China  has  had  no  emigrant 
whose  career  has  been  more  picturesque ; she  has  had  no 
son  who  was  more  loyal ; at  home  among  his  people  they 
merely  tell  you  that  he  did  his  duty  to  his  forefathers  and 
his  country,  and  that  he  will  therefore  never  lack  a male 
heir  to  bow  before  his  tablet. 

The  doorways  and  gateways  are  a mine  for  the  illus- 
trator, in  their  quaint  lines  of  stucco.  Through  many 
a gate  of  ancient  wrought  iron  work  glimpses  were  had 
of  luxuriant  tropical  gardens,  hid  behind  high  white- 
washed chunam  walls,  which  glistened  like  a porcupine 
with  their  armor  of  green,  broken  Munchen  bottles  stuck 
in  the  plaster.  From  ten  a.  m.  until  four  p.  m.  the  almost 
breezeless,  burning  streets  are  deserted.  In  the  silent 
night  the  native  watchman  drags  his  wooden  sandals 
noisily  along  and  strikes  his  drum  as  he  goes  his  rounds, 
so  that  thieves  and  evil  spirits  may  know  his  whereabouts, 
and  work  elsewhere. 

, When  England,  in  the  days  of  Henry  VIII.  was  war- 


THE  PORTUGUESE  AND  CAMOENS  87 


ring  no  farther  away  from  home  than  France,  Macao, 
at  the  end  of  the  earth,  was  strenuous  in  daring  struggles. 
The  Dutch  attacked  St.  Francis  Fort,  but  drew  off  their 
battered  boats  in  defeat.  The  old  copper  cannon  still 
glisten  on  the  picturesque  ramparts,  and  beneath  the  white 
stucco  sentry  boxes.  At  the  Monte  Fort  they  cast  can- 
non, and  when  war  of  their  own  was  not  on,  turned  a 
penny  by  selling  the  armament  (the  institution  of  manu- 
factures in  China),  as  in  1651,  to  the  king  of  Cochin 
China.  In  1622,  two  hundred  Spanish  infantry,  and 
some  cannon  arrived  from  Manila  to  help  the  Macaense 
against  the  Dutch.  In  Macao  of  to-day,  opium  is  taxed 
and  gambling  farmed,  to  feed  the  depleted  purse  of  a 
decaying  Portugal.  Macao  was  the  emporium  of  South- 
ern China  until  1840,  when  she  was  superseded  by  British 
Hong-Kong,  which  lies  forty  miles  eastward,  and  that 
the  feeling  of  resentment  toward  the  British  still  rankles 
in  the  Macaense  breast  on  this  account,  is  evidenced  by 
Montalto  de  Jesus’  history  of  Macao,  published  as  late 
as  1902,  when  every  one  supposed  that  the  remembrance 
of  the  slave  barracoons  and  opium  had  been  lost  long  ago. 

In  this  old  city  of  China,  once  lived  and  wrote  the 
illustrious  poet  whose  name  reads  like  a jewel,  and  is 
sounded  with  the  rich  vowels  of  Greece.  Camoens  was 
over  forty  when  he  completed  his  epic.  He  died  in 
Portugal,  alas  a victim  of  the  Black  Death,  which,  in  its 
own  melancholy  haunts,  he  had  defied  a thousand  times. 
The  bubonic  plague  which  was  then  attacking  Europe, 
originated  in  the  territory  of  Camoens’  exile.  It  exists 
there  to-day,  and  is  the  terror  which  arises  every  May 
in  Hong-Kong  and  Canton,  alarming  the  ships  that  ply 
therefrom  to  every  European  port.  In  Camoens’  time 
the  plague  went  overland  from  mephitic  Yunnan  to  Bur- 


88 


THE  CHINESE 


mah,  following  the  Moorish  traders  from  China  to  India, 
and  the  Red  Sea,  and  by  Arabic  caravan  to  Constanti- 
nople and  Venice.  I'o  trace  its  dire  sweep  through 
Milan  and  London,  we  need  only  read  the  terror-stricken 
pages  of  Manzoni  and  Pepys.  Camoens,  like  Cervantes, 
in  the  fashion  of  the  time,  was  soldier  before  being  poet. 
He  was  a Hermes  in  regular  features  and  curly  yellow 
hair.  In  those  days  statesmen  were  poets  first  and 
courtiers  afterward.  Such  were  the  talented  and  gal- 
lant Sortelha  and  Conde  de  Vimiosa.  The  Infanta, 
Donna  Maria,  led  her  court  in  epigram  and  sonnet. 
Portugal  in  the  days  of  Camoens  was  a forerunner  of 
what  England  was  to  become  in  the  time  of  Raleigh. 
Arms,  adventure  and  literature  danced  the  measure,  and 
the  actor  played  equally  well  all  three  roles.  For  a while 
Camoens  was  the  favorite  of  the  Lisbon  Court,  until  that 
unfortunate  day  when  his  admiring  eyes  fell  on  the 
golden-tressed  Donna  Caterina,  kneeling  at  prayer  in  the 
Church  of  the  Chagos.  Then  his  woes  began,  but  with 
his  woes  upgrew  his  character,  his  interest  in  mankind  of 
all  colors  and  religions,  and  his  fame.  The  Donna  Cate- 
rina was  of  the  queen’s  household,  and  the  court  op- 
posed a suit,  which  was  beyond  his  station.  But  this 
temerity  also  was  the  fashion  of  the  time,  for  poor  Tasso 
had  similarly  loved  at  Ferrara. 

Camoens  was  born  in  1524  at  Lisbon.  The  world  had 
almost  forgotten  classicism.  The  Renaissance  and  Boc- 
caccio were  long  asleep.  Chaucer  had  died  in  England, 
and  all  seemed  dark  again.  It  was  yet  a long  cry  to  the 
births  of  Shakespeare  and  Milton.  The  Renaissance  had 
sown  the  seed  of  ideals,  but  the  seed  was  slumbering.  In 
Camoens’  time,  Portugal  was  to  rise,  thrilled  with  the 
new  life,  and  her  glory  it  was  to  give  India,  South 


THE  PORTUGUESE  AND  CAMOENS  89 


America,  Asia,  and  the  seas  of  all  the  globe  to  the  vision 
and  touch  of  marveling  men.  It  was  a generation  of 
gods,  but  as  ever  the  gods  whom  men  make  have  feet 
of  clay.  Greece’s  clay  was  State’s  rights  politics; 
Portugal’s  was  ill-distributed  wealth.  Camoens’  fate 
drifted  into  a current  that  bore  him  far  from  his  sun,  the 
Donna  Caterina,  and  a rival  Andrade  de  Caminha,  who 
could  also  touch  the  lyre,  but  dressed  in  a more  fashion- 
able livery,  displaced  him.  Banished  by  captious  royalty 
from  the  court,  Camoens  fought  under  his  country’s 
flag  in  Africa  with  no  diminution  of  patriotism,  which 
showed  the  man  he  was,  because  in  those  days  there  was 
no  democratic  sentiment  to  laugh  with  those  whom  soci- 
ety snubs.  In  leading  a boarding  party  over  the  bul- 
warks of  a Moorish  galley  off  Ceuta,  he  lost  his  right 
eye.  With  the  dauntless  spirit  of  the  traveler,  but  with 
the  broken  heart  of  a lover,  at  twilight  on  a day  in  March, 
1553,  aboard  the  San  Bento,  he  put  out  once  more  from 
the  golden  Tagus.  He  was  then  twenty-nine  years  of 
age.  In  nine  months  he  was  in  Goa,  on  the  Malabar 
coast  of  India,  and  it  was  here  on  his  way  home  with  his 
immortal  poem.  The  Lusiad,  seventeen  years  later, 
that  he  was  to  hear  of  the  death  of  the  inspirer  of  his 
youth,  the  Donna  Caterina.  Life  for  a while  was  ad- 
venture only.  The  feats  of  arms  were  considerable, 
sometimes  two  thousand  being  slain.  In  winter  there 
w’ere  Moors  to  pursue  at  Ormuz,  and  through  the  summer 
heat,  in  dissipated  days  for  most  of  his  companions,  they 
dreamed  at  Goa.  Owing  to  a satire  of  Camoens,  who 
was  engaged  in  more  intellectual  if  not  more  tactful  work 
than  wine-bibbing.  Governor  Barreto  banished  him  from 
Goa  to  the  little  colony  of  Macao  in  China. 

When  the  discouraged  poet  first  saw  Macao  from  the 


90 


THE  CHINESE 


sea  he  wrote : “ In  this  lonely,  sterile,  sun-scorched  land 

did  fortune  will  that  my  life  be  passed,  and  in  fragments 
be  scattered  throughout  the  world.”  Here  he  finally 
found  the  cords  of  life  pulling  taut,  and  the  breeze  sure 
and  full,  with  a course  laid  which  he  might  sail,  unpur- 
sued of  enemies.  He  had  a luxuriant  garden;  a small 
competence  as  “ Trustee  of  the  Estates  of  Those  at 
Home,”  for  the  faint-hearted  soon  left  if  they  might ; and 
a devoted  Javanese  slave.  The  angel  of  fame,  as  present 
in  the  ends  of  the  earth  as  in  the  temple  of  Delphi,  gave 
him  a language  to  seal  to  a people,  and  an  epic  whose 
theme  is  the  widest  man  has  sung.  In  the  yellow  matting 
junk  sails  of  the  Pearl  he  dreamed  that  he  beheld  the 
argosies  of  classic  song,  and  the  gong  of  the  Confucian 
rang  in  his  fancy  as  the  cymbal  of  Bacchus.  Without  the 
accommodating  temper  of  the  soldier,  the  poet’s  imagina- 
tion in  him  would  have  sunk  in  despair.  Courage  held 
him  up  in  his  lonely  life.  Poesy  was  the  bread  of  his 
soul.  His  theme  was  his  nation,  and  patriotism  was  held 
by  him  almost  in  a frenzy.  His  was  that  refined  patri- 
otism which  sees  one’s  country,  not  as  she  is  or  has 
treated  him,  but  as  she  would  be  when  he  had  in  love  re- 
molded her. 

I have  seen  the  proud  Macaense  gathered  about  the 
poet’s  bust  at  the  famous  grotto  at  Macao,  while  an  ora- 
tor, tearful  with  emotion,  recited  the  proud  cadences  of 
the  great  song  of  his  dying  race.  Camoens  was  the 
Homer  of  the  Portuguese,  and  Da  Gama  and  Albuquerque 
were  his  Ulysses  and  Eurylochus.  Almost  within  his 
lifetime,  Portugal  was  the  shore  that  abutted  on  the  sea 
of  oblivion.  Within  his  memory,  the  African  coast  had 
been  ventured  along.  Good  Hope  rounded,  Azores  found, 
Brazil  discovered  by  accident,  India  linked  by  a sea  route, 


^lacao,  the  Inner  Praya.  Curious  house  with  bamboo  roof  s^arden, 
oyster-shell  windows,  brick,  tile,  and  stucco  work; 
architecture  showing  Portuguese  influence 
of  the  past  five  centuries. 


The  beautiful  marljle  and  teak  Royal  Palace,  Peking,  where  the 
Emperor  Kwang  Su  and  Dowager  Empress  died  in  November, 
1908,  The  grotescpie  lions  attract  sculi)tors  from  the  whole  world. 


THE  PORTUGUESE  AND  CAMOENS  91 


and  Lisbon  displaced  Venice  as  the  capital  of  the  world 
and  the  hub  of  luxury  and  fashion.  The  “ celibate  of 
Sagre,”  Prince  Henry  the  Navigator,  in  his  court  at 
Cape  St.  Vincent,  was  the  brother  of  these  greatest  of 
discoverers,  this  “ Company  of  Captains.”  Vessels  were 
then  half-decked,  and  carried  thirty-six  sailors.  It  was 
with  four  of  these  caravels  that  Da  Gama  took  a year  to 
reach  India.  Not  only  to  the  south  went  the  intrepid 
Portuguese,  for  Martin  Lopez  discovered  Nova  Zembla 
on  a search  northeast  for  Cathay.  Evora’s  caravans 
ventured  the  dreariest,  hottest  and  widest  desert  of  the 
earth,  then  called  Guebla,  as  far  as  Timbuctoo.  Andrade 
reached  fabled  Peking  in  1521.  Magellan,  bowing  under 
the  auspicious  sign  of  the  Southern  Cross,  parted  the 
violet  veil  that  concealed  the  Pacific,  and  Pinto  landed  in 
quaint  Japan  in  1537.  Little  Portugal  is  the  grand- 
mother of  the  world.  In  every  glass  of  her  famous  wine, 
that  breathes  the  richest  boquet  at  our  dinners,  she 
should  be  toasted  by  the  nations  on  whom  she  has  be- 
stowed her  heritage  of  discovery.  The  vast,  world- 
encircling  commerce  of  modern  times  was  founded  by 
Portugal  in  the  fifteenth  century.  Some  day  a baron  of 
British,  American  or  Japanese  shipping,  who  has  a taste 
for  history,  may  desire  to  perpetuate  gratitude  by  erecting 
at  Sagre,  in  old  Portugal,  a monument  to  Prince  Henry 
the  Navigator.  In  St.  Francis  Xavier,  who  came  to  Goa 
in  1542,  Portugal  instituted  world  missions.  In  the 
noble  De  Castro,  invincible  in  battle  and  pure  in  life, 
she  has  given  a hero  to  song  and  story.  From  the  Moors 
and  Venetians  in  the  Red  Sea  and  India,  this  soldier  won 
dominion  for  the  Portuguese,  and  died  in  the  arms  of 
Xavier,  bequeathing  to  his  son  “ his  only  spoils  and 
riches,  a sword  unrivaled  and  spotless  of  shame.” 


92 


THE  CHINESE 


These  are  the  antecedents  of  Camoens  and  the  heroes 
of  his  epic  Os  Lusiadas,  which  was  published  in 
Lisbon  in  1572.  The  French  Montesquieu  wrote:  “ It 

makes  us  feel  something  of  the  charms  of  the  Odyssey 
and  the  magnificence  of  the  ^neid.”  The  English  Hal- 
1am  called  it  “ the  first  successful  attempt  in  Europe  to 
construct  an  epic  poem  on  the  ancient  model;  it  is  the 
mirror  of  a heart  full  of  love,  courage,  generosity  and 
patriotism.”  Doctor  Johnson  contemplated  the  transla- 
tion of  the  poem,  but  afterward  invited  Goldsmith,  with 
his  larger  sympathy  and  understanding  of  travel,  to  do  the 
work.  Voltaire  called  Camoens  the  “ Milton  of  the 
Portuguese.”  The  first  translation  in  English  of  The 
Lusiad  was  made  by  Richard  Fanshaw,  a literary  diplo- 
mat of  Charles  II. ’s  reign.  It  has  been  translated  into 
English  by  Aubertin,  Sir  Richard  Burton,  and  Thomas 
Musgrave.  Mickle’s  translation,  made  in  1776,  is  prob- 
ably the  best  known.  The  stately  iambics  of  that  transla- 
tion do  not  do  justice  to  the  sprightly  dactyls  and  silvery 
rhyme  of  the  original.  The  metaphors  are  luxuriant,  as 
about  our  classic  forms  the  poet  twined  the  colored  vines 
of  oriental  fancy.  Camoens  had  been  first  a lyrist.  The 
purity  of  form  of  the  Italian  sonnet  had  influenced  him. 
He  was  profoundly  educated  at  the  University  of  Coim- 
bra, then  at  the  height  of  its  renown,  in  the  Greek  and 
Latin  poets.  In  The  Lusiad,  he  broke  from  the  severe 
classical  style  of  his  compatriot  Ribeiro  and  the  Italian  in- 
fluence of  Miranda,  which  looked  to  the  past  only,  and 
founded  a virile  Portuguese  language,  which  adopted  the 
best  of  what  was  new  and  strong  in  the  experience  of  the 
traveled,  of  whom  he  was  the  chief.  His  poem  is  the 
bond  of  the  Portuguese  at  home,  in  wide  Brazil,  Goa,  Mo- 
zambique, Macao,  and  Hong-Kong.  Virgil  was  his  mas- 


THE  PORTUGUESE  AND  CAMOENS  93 


ter  in  elaborating  a theme.  Voltaire  pointed  out  that  a 
serious  fault  of  the  poem  is  in  the  commingling  of  Chris- 
tian and  classic  imagery.  In  Camoens’  epic  there 
breathes  a similar  religious  purpose  to  that  which  con- 
sumed Milton.  Milton  exalted  his  story  to  the  heavens. 
Camoens  chose  a theme  all  human,  which  trailed  its  in- 
domitable course  over  the  most  dangerous  paths  of  the 
world  in  the  half-awakened  morning  of  the  newly  dis- 
covered planet. 

This  is  the  theme  of  The  Lusiad;  the  history  of  Portu- 
gal at  the  acme  of  her  glory,  and  the  spirit  and  past  of 
ancient  Macao,  where  the  conception  of  it  all  was  nursed, 
and  where  it  was  brought  to  bloom.  It  is  the  greatest 
epic  of  travel;  the  history  of  the  feud  between  Moorish 
caravan  and  Portuguese  caravel  for  the  first  sandal- 
scented  oriental  commerce.  The  arena  spreads  from  the 
arid  plains  of  Arabia  to  the  dancing  purple  waters  of 
India.  The  rounding  of  the  Cape  of  Storms  (Good 
Hope)  with  the  frail  vessels  of  that  age  has  probably 
been  the  most  awesome  adventure  in  the  imagination  of 
mortals.  India  by  overland  route  had  been  reached; 
South  America  had  been  discovered;  the  Atlantic  was 
ferried ; but  the  demons  of  the  lost  were  believed  to  have 
placed  an  insurmountable  barrier,  reaching  into  the  tur- 
bulent unknown,  between  India  and  Europe.  When  the 
Portuguese  captains  first  set  sail,  Europe  was  mist- 
wrapped  and  demon-haunted  off  shore,  like  Turner’s 
painting,  Ulysses  Deriding  Polyphemus,  only  here  and 
there  a galleon,  after  the  blessing  of  the  waters  and  unc- 
tion for  the  sailors,  braving  a narrow  sea;  Venice  ven- 
turing along  the  Mediterranean  shore ; Flanders  assailing 
the  Baltic,  and  England  smiting  the  channel  with  her 
Viking  prows.  From  the  dark  Moors,  who,  it  was 


94 


THE  CHINESE 


rumored,  had  sent  out  adventurers  on  waters  mysterious, 
Prince  Henry  the  Navigator  learned  that  Africa  prob- 
ably extended  to  the  equator.  Henry’s  first  salvage 
from  the  deeps  was  Madeira,  and  upon  that  success  he 
sent  out  captain  after  captain,  like  one  possessed  of  a uni- 
versal vision.  Probably  the  most  ecstatic  thrill  of  the 
human  imagination  has  been  accorded  to  this  famous 
prince  who  was  as  scientific  as  he  was  enthusiastic, 
though  history  has  not  so  credited  him. 

The  Lusiad’s  hero  is  Vasco  Da  Gama,  and  its  story, 
his  adventures  from  Lisbon  to  Calicut  in  India,  during 
the  two  years  and  two  months  which  it  took  him  to  make 
the  voyage.  The  Moslems  were  masters  of  the  Eastern 
waters  and  Calicut  was  their  emporium.  The  first  canto  of 
the  epic  is  fresh  with  new  pictures  of  the  new-found  far 
East : “ The  sails  they  hoisted  were  of  matting  made, 

woven  of  leaves  of  palm  trees.”  Canto  Three  contains 
the  famous  romance  of  Ignez  de  Castro,  which  secured 
Voltaire’s  enthusiasm,  and  is  one  of  the  most  celebrated 
in  all  literature.  The  gentle  Ignez  was  maid  of  honor 
to  the  Infanta,  and  was  clandestinely  married  to  the 
heir,  Don  Pedro.  When  this  was  discovered  by  the 
ambitious  and  cruel  King  Alphonso,  he  ordered  Ignez 
to  be  murdered.  When  Pedro  succeeded  to  the  king- 
dom, he  ordered  his  bride’s  remains  to  be  disinterred 
and  placed  on  the  throne,  and  the  homage  of  the  people 
done  to  her,  as  a saint  who  was  queen  even  in  death. 
The  figures  of  the  story  are  woven  with  the  luxuriousness 
of  Keats: 

Estavas  Undo  Ignez,  posta  em  socego; 

Mas  ella  os  olhos,  comqne  o ar  sercna.” 

“ Behold  her,  fair  Ignez,  deep-bosomed  in  quiet ; 

Soft-turning  her  eyes,  e’en  the  cruel  air  she  calnieth.” 


THE  PORTUGUESE  AND  CAMOENS  95 


Adventure,  classic  allusion  and  romance,  succeed  one 
another  in  limpid  and  alluring  verse,  and  strength  is  not 
lacking,  as  witness  the  stupendous  battle  masterpiece  in 
describing  Aljubarota.  Voltaire,  cynical  concerning  the 
poem  as  a whole  because  he  hated  the  joys  of  the 
imagination  not  less  than  the  confident  truths  of  ex- 
perience, was  carried  away  despite  himself  with  the  vision 
of  Adamastor  in  Canto  Five.  The  pictures  of  storms 
have  the  true  sweep  of  typhonic  nature,  from  the  experi- 
ence of  fearful  months  of  privation  and  danger  by  the 
poet  himself  on  the  yellow  Chinese  seas,  in  days  when 
ships  were  merely  shells.  It  is  interesting  to  know  what 
the  Lusitanian  thought  of  his  less  cultured  neighbors. 
He  calls  the  Teutons  “ all  pride,  rebels  to  creed,”  and  the 
English  through  whose  taciturnity  few  Latins  have  ever 
penetrated  to  discover  any  real  idealism  or  vivacious  en- 
joyment of  achievement,  he  called : “ hard,  in  Hyper- 
borean winters  walled.”  Canto  Nine  contains  the  be- 
witching allegory  of  the  Isles  of  Love,  which  Venus 
brings  from  the  sea.  Here  Camoens  has  shed  the  adorn- 
ing fancies  of  the  Orient  on  the  forms  of  Greece,  and 
every  line  revels  in  coruscating  color.  Thus  through 
strange  lands  and  beautiful  story  does  he  bring  the  Lu- 
sians  back  to  Lisbon,  and  lays  his  poem  at  the  feet  of  the 
nation.  He  is  buried  in  the  Franciscan  Church  of  Santa 
Anna  at  Lisbon,  and  upon  his  tomb  are  the  lachrymal 
words  where  Fame  charges  Life  with  treachery;  “He 
excelled  all  the  poets  of  his  time;  he  lived  poor  and 
miserable,  and  he  died  so.” 

The  poet’s  fame  is  more  beautifully  kept  at  Macao.  In 
the  grotto  of  his  exile,  the  world’s  poets,  among  them  the 
exquisite  English  hymn-writer.  Governor  Sir  John  Bow- 
ring of  near-by  Hong-Kong,  have  carved  in  the  enduring 


96 


THE  CHINESE 


granite  of  the  Chinese  hills,  their  gentle  lines  of  praise 
about  the  poet’s  bust  in  honor  of  their  pilgrimage,  which 
is  the  only  one  in  the  Orient  of  European  literary  associ- 
ation. The  banyan,  the  tamarind  and  bamboo  keep  shade 
in  the  poet’s  garden.  The  tuberoses,  camellias  and 
azaleas  make  the  air  dense  as  with  censers.  Still  does 
the  Chukiang  (Pearl)  roll  beneath  his  seat  and  whisper 
the  old  lullabies.  The  yellow  matting  sails  still  drift 
with  the  returning  tides,  as  in  the  evenings  long  ago, 
when  they  were  borne  slowly  from  the  poet’s  vision  into 
the  wide  oriental  sunset  of  cloudless  gold.  Soft  oars 
beat  by  in  the  dusk,  as  though  the  poet’s  spirit  passed 
along.  A silver  gong  from  a belated  junk  strikes  the 
first  stars  into  being,  as  once  before  in  a land  where  there 
is  no  twilight,  they  showered  from  the  fingers  of  a 
Southern  Night,  to  teach  their  music  of  the  soul  to  a 
lost  one  at  last  attuned  to  their  purposes,  the  exile  Louis 
de  Camoens. 


Ill 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE  AMONG  THE  CHINESE 

Lives  there  a land  which  has  no  political  parties?  Then 
look  there  for  the  secret  society  in  all  its  rank  luxuri- 
ance. China  abounds  in  it.  Socially  its  curse  is  that  it 
upholds  its  members  in  private  evil  more  than  in  the  public 
good  at  which  its  charter  loftily  aims,  and  from  the  exer- 
cise of  which  it  is  prevented  by  the  present  stunted  consti- 
tution of  the  country.  At  Tientsin  there  is  a house 
known  to  foreigners  from  its  door  as  the  “ Society  of  the 
Red  Door.”  To  the  initiated  it  is  the  “ Society  which 
Meets  Injury  with  Retaliation.”  The  branch  at  Hang- 
chow, known  as  Hung  Pang,  or  Red  Association,  is 
constantly  fomenting  rice  riots  between  the  villagers  and 
the  up-country  boatmen  who  arrive  from  the  Grand 
Canal,  as  a pretext  for  political  risings.  Only  recently 
they  captured  a prefectural  city  and  it  was  necessary  to 
call  upon  the  reorganized  Imperial  troops  to  dislodge 
them.  In  Che-kiang  Province  the  Chiu  Sik  Lun  (Earthen 
Pot  Society)  murdered  a governor  in  August,  1907,  for 
discouraging  the  principles  of  the  New  China  party, 
and  the  effect  has  eddied  at  last  as  far  as  Peking,  in  the 
institution  of  the  new  Supreme  Council,  whose  duties  are 
proclaimed  to  be  the  educating  of  the  country  toward 
representative  government.  The  echoes  of  the  fourth 
century  rescripts  of  Honorius,  or  the  nearer  melancholy 
of  the  Chinese  edicts  of  1898!  Unless  China  does  more 
for  real  representation,  dissolution  is  not  staved  off  for 

97 


98 


THE  CHINESE 


ever,  any  more  than  it  was  during  the  lingering  centuries 
of  the  Roman  Empire.  Advance  and  a partial  reaction 
divide  history,  and  China  has  had  her  share  of  the  latter 
during  the  Manchu  tenancy  of  the  throne.  The  most 
famous  secret  society  is  the  Triad  (Sam  Hop  Wui),  the 
members  of  which  are  supposed  to  go  armed  for  private 
revenge,  in  addition  to  the  great  aim  of  their  body  to 
enthrone  a native  dynasty.  They  are  ruled  by  a Master 
of  the  Red  Stick,  who  sets  the  penalties.  The  “ Society 
of  the  Sword  ” is  also  anti-dynastic,  and  strong  in  the 
central  provinces  for  the  new  patriotism.  During  the 
New  Year  celebration  of  two  weeks,  all  secret  societies, 
as  well  as  the  guilds,  whose  rivalry  also  is  often  very 
bitter,  declare  a “ Truce  of  the  Gods,”  when  no  man  may 
attack  his  brother.  This  is  generally  respected.  Both 
the  hunter  and  the  hunted  are  glad  of  a relief,  when  they 
may  feel  free  to  travel,  or  be  careless  in  the  use  of  their 
samschu  wine. 

The  statute  books  contain  the  unrepealed  death  penalty 
for  belonging  to  some  of  the  secret  societies,  such  as  the 
Gee  Kung  Tong,  which  also  is  a Freemasonry  vowed  to 
the  work  of  driving  from  the  throne  the  Manchu  house 
of  Tsings  and  establishing  thereon  descendants  of  the 
Mings,  but  the  government  does  not  dare  to  enforce  the 
statute.  They  would  have  to  depopulate  the  kingdom 
if  they  did.  The  Ko  Lo  Win  is  a similar  anti- 
dynastic  society.  The  branch  of  the  society  among  the 
emigrants  in  Malaysia  is  called  the  Orchids,  and  lines 
of  their  poetry  are  breezy  enough  to  dispel  the  ennui  of, 
exiles.  “ We  are  strong  and  spread  everywhere,  com- 
mand hills  and  rivers;  despise  us  who  dare.  Lo!  In 
P'u-kien,  a black  flag  flying;  Attention!  Kun  Su  is  the 
place  for  gathering.” 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


99 


Candidates  are  sometimes  rushed  for  election  by  being 
kidnapped  in  bags  and  brought  to  the  lodge  room. 
Meetings  are  called  by  split  bamboos  being  left  at  the 
residences  of  the  members.  Since  1845  in  Hong-Kong, 
and  a later  date  in  Singapore,  the  British  government 
has  prohibited  meetings  of  the  Triad  Society.  Where 
murders  are  committed,  the  sentence  of  death  is  passed 
upon  the  local  leaders,  whether  they  are  present  or 
not.  In  a trial  at  Sarawak,  Straits  Settlements,  under 
British  law,  in  April,  1906,  a jury  composed  of  eight 
Chinese  towkays,  three  Malays  and  one  European  (fore- 
man) passed  sentence  of  death  upon  eight  leaders  for 
the  murder  of  one  victim  of  the  Triads. 

The  Buddhists  have  a temperance  society  called  the 
Tsai  Li,  which  has  effectively  adopted  the  anti-opium 
crusade,  and  its  enthusiasm  is  stimulated  by  certain 
secret  society  rules,  which  are  so  dear  to  the  Chinese 
heart.  In  the  same  way  religiously.  Buddhism  got  her 
roots  safely  in  Chinese  ground  by  adopting  ancestor 
worship.  The  Oriental  distrusts  iconoclasts. 

That  a hidden  tide  is  undermining  educational  China 
is  most  marked  in  the  discontinuance,  in  their  old  form, 
of  the  triennial  classical  examinations  which  have  been 
in  vogue  thirteen  hundred  years,  and  whose  three  degrees 
of  Hsiuts’  ai  (Budding  Talent)  answering  to  our  B.A. ; 
Chujen  (M.A.),  and  Chin  Shih  (D.C.L.)  for  w'hich  a 
yellow  diploma  with  red  characters  was  issued, — alone 
opened  the  way  to  political  employment,  which  is  con- 
sidered the  highest  profession  in  the  land.  Nien  shu 
tso  kuan:  “Get  education  and  position  will  get  you.” 

Examination  for  the  higher  degrees  included  reexam- 
ination in  considerable  of  the  lower.  No  such  feats  of 
memory  have  ever  been  required  of  students,  and  where 


lOO 


THE  CHINESE 


this  faculty  alone  is  required,  the  oriental  student  is 
invincible  in  American  colleges.  .Where  our  students 
speak  of  “ ponies  ” and  “ cribs,”  the  oriental  student 
jokes  about  his  “skin  paper,”  but  so  cumbersome  is  the 
language  that  a crib,  to  be  of  any  use,  would  be  de- 
tectable. A red  sash  is  worn  from  the  right  shoulder 
to  the  left  waist.  During  the  examination,  the  student 
in  his  cell  recalls  that  at  home,  and  in  the  pagoda,  his 
family  have  hung  lamps  before  the  idol  as  votives  on 
his  behalf.  Even  though  the  successful  scholar  enters 
business  he  is  considered  of  the  Shin  Kin,  or  gentry  of 
his  district,  there  being  no  landed  titles.  A branch  of 
the  olive  is  waved  over  the  winner’s  head,  and  frequently 
he  is  hazed  and  “ run  ” for  secret  societies.  Like  the 
Campanile  of  St.  Mark’s,  without  immediate  warning, 
this  famous  institution  has  tumbled  in  Kwangtung  and 
is  being  reerected  with  the  Tsin  Tsueh  or  new  learning 
taking  the  place  of  one  third  of  the  old.  The  first  blow 
at  the  old  system  was  really  struck  by  the  lately  deceased 
emperor,  Kwang  Su,  in  his  famous  reformatory  edicts 
of  1898,  when  he  was  disturbed  by  the  shocks  of  and  the 
reasons  for  his  defeat  by  Japan.  Every  village  is  now 
striving  to  possess  a Hok  Tong  (day  school)  which 
will  conform  with  the  new  standards  of  the  Board  of 
Education,  whose  requirements  include  military  drill. 
The  most  radical  decrees  in  the  history  of  the  throne, 
those  of  Kwong  Su  in  1897,  were  addressed  to  man- 
darins and  “ schoolmasters.”  The  new  text  books  use 
illustration  to  the  fullest  advantages.  These  books,  as 
well  as  the  maps  and  globes,  are  at  present  all  prepared 
in  Japan.  Many  Japanese  teachers  are  employed,  and 
numbers  of  them  as  professors  in  English.  Education 
and  property  will  equally  be  the  qualification  for  suffrage 


CO^vricmT.  IM«.  Tmc  •Oau-Htaniu  COMPANY 

A fine  view  of  river  life.  Canton,  South  China;  temple  with  gable 
carvings  in  foreground ; three  pawnshop  towers  in  distance. 


North  Wall  of  Canton  and  “ l•'ivc-story  I’agoda."  Note  in  feme- 
ground  marble  graves  of  two  native  rich 
set  in  hare  hillside. 


men. 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE  loi 

in  electing  the  proposed  provincial  parliaments,  which 
are  suggested  for  trial  two  years  hence  by  the  Kiun  Ki 
Chu,  or  new  Supreme  Council. 

In  1905  China  sent  ten  thousand  pupils  to  Japan,  in 
1906  she  doubled  the  number,  which  has  been  increasing 
right  along.  When  America  in  1908  waived  rights  to 
half  of  her  share  of  the  Boxer  indemnity  of  1900, 
China  enthusiastically  reciprocated  by  recruiting  scholars 
to  go  to  America’s  colleges  and  schools.  The  future 
will  show  that  this  move  was  one  of  unusual  brilliance 
on  America’s  part.  Hong-Kong  for  some  time  has 
possessed  a medical  school  for  Chinese,  and  Singa- 
pore, through  the  generosity  of  the  towkays,  has  af- 
forded similar  opportunities  to  natives.  Canton  is  soon 
to  have  bestowed  upon  it  a medical  college  under  the 
auspices  of  the  University  of  Pennsylvania,  which  with 
the  branch  of  Yale  College  called  “ Elegant  Proprieties  ” 
at  Changsha,  Hunan’s  capital,  have  here  the  opportunity 
to  seize  an  influence  and  do  a work  with  the  more  in- 
telligent natives,  which  missionary  societies  have  failed 
in  because  of  the  suspicion  attending  purely  religious 
auspices  at  the  present  time.  Prophetically,  the  first 
patent  issued  by  China  was  granted  to  a Nankinese  for 
an  electric  light,  which  of  course  adopted  a poetic 
name,  “ the  new  moonshine.”  As  you  enter  the  palace 
at  Peking,  the  new  and  the  old  display  themselves  in 
an  unusual  fraternization.  The  lacquered  teak  bars  have 
been  displaced  by  plate  glass  doors,  on  which  the  word 
“ Sho  ” (long  life)  has  been  emblazoned  in  immense 
red  characters.  In  the  new  schools  in  Kwangtung 
the  provincial  government  is  offering  the  high  salary  of 
thirty  dollars  Mexican  (fifteen  dollars  gold)  a month  to 
native  teachers.  Those  who  have  had  experience  in  mis- 


102 


THE  CHINESE 


sion  schools  are  preferred,  for  this  province  remembers 
that  other  wonderful  mission  school  pupil,  the  famous 
Hung  Siu  Tsuen  who  nearly  reached  the  oldest  and  wid- 
est throne  of  the  ages.  It  is  to  be  hoped  that  the  sacred 
Kings,  and  the  Confucian  collection  of  prose  and  verse, 
will  always  retain  the  place  in  the  culture  of  the  na- 
tion that  is  held  by  Greek  literature  in  western  refine- 
ment. Chinese  travelers  say : “ When  you  seek  culture 
go  to  Canton;  when  you  seek  its  opposite,  go  to  Fu- 
chau.” 

The  proudest  procession  of  the  clan  is  the  mar- 
riage procession,  and  in  it  the  highest  of  all  the  banners 
are  those  naming  the  men  who  have  won  literary  degrees. 
A graduate  erects  a flagpole  before  his  home,  and  his 
proud  father  nails  on  it  a triangle.  The  ten  thousand 
stalls  in  dreary  rows  at  Wuchang  across  the  river  from 
Han-kau,  the  seventeen  thousand  brick  booths  in  the 
western  capital,  Chingtoo;  and  the  fifteen  thousand  cells 
at  Nanking,  stand  empty,  like  our  fair-ground  booths 
between  seasons,  and  down  the  walks  blow  the  leaves  of 
the  old  examination  papers, — a literary  Vollombrosa  in 
autumn.  Many  of  the  ten  thousand  stalls  at  Canton, 
which  every  traveler  will  recall  by  the  fine  camphor- 
trees  in  the  sixteen-acre  park,  have  been  razed  to  provide 
a site  for  a modern  university.  Students  who  fail  to 
secure  the  highest  degree  recall  as  an  ill  omen  the  name 
of  the  examination  hall  at  Peking,  that  of  “ Intense 
Mental  Exercise.”  In  these  stalls  the  candidates  remain 
for  days,  until  they  complete  their  papers.  Their  name 
is  pasted  within  a fold  of  the  paper,  and  the  pocket  is 
not  opened  until  the  examiner  has  perused  and  marked 
the  answers.  The  students  are  expected  to  bring  suf- 
ficient food,  tea  and  covering  to  last  during  their  occu- 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE  103 

pancy,  and  they  may  not  hold  conversation  with  soldiers 
on  guard,  or  with  other  candidates.  The  booths  are 
rough  brick  const vuctions  like  sentry  boxes,  and  are 
often  daubed  in  blue  with  some  classical  inscription. 
While  the  lowest  peasant  may  compete,  four  classes  are 
debarred,  in  this  most  democratic  of  countries,  where 
there  has  never  been  a nobility  in  perpetuity,  except  the 
direct  line  from  Confucius.  The  tabooed  classes  are 
court  eunuchs,  barbers,  actors  and  keepers  of  opium 
dens  (i.e.,  a class  who  answer  to  our  saloon  keepers). 
As  in  every  university,  it  is  found  that  the  higher  edu- 
cation emasculates  the  character  and  independence  of  a 
small  percentage.  Certain  students  who  pass  high,  and 
are  the  sons  of  poor  men,  advertise  that  they  offer  them- 
selves as  the  sons-in-law,  or  adopted  sons  of  rich  men 
who  have  daughters  but  no  sons.  There  is  not  a 
Chinese,  however  poor,  who  will  endure  being  without 
some  one  to  carrj'  his  name,  and  sacrifice  to  his  manes 
and  tablet.  He  could  not  otherwise  face  death  with 
composure,  or  what  is  harder,  he  could  not  face  this 
obloquy  of  fortune  during  life.  Even  the  beggars 
and  the  lepers  search  the  banks  for  some  human  drift- 
wood to  adopt.  This  motif  takes  the  place  in  Chinese 
novels  of  our  theme  of  love,  and  is  also  the  incentive 
for  most  of  their  humor.  The  Chinese  have  furnished 
historic  proof  that  an  eastern  race  being  founded  on 
Thought,  does  not  disintegrate  when  its  men  of  action, 
like  Genghis  and  Kublai  Khan,  pass  away.  It  is  quite 
a different  thing  to  endow  with  Thought,  and  thus  make 
permanent  a race  founded  on  Action, — and  so  have 
passed  away,  when  their  leaders  fell,  Nineveh,  Mace- 
donia, and  the  Empires  of  Charlemagne  and  Napoleon. 

England  and  America  jointly  contribute  five  million 


104 


THE  CHINESE 


dollars  a year  toward  the  education  of  China,  in  the 
salaries  paid  missionaries,  colporteurn  and  medical  men, 
but  this  is  a very  small  tax,  considering  the  trade  which 
the  two  countries  enjoy  with  China.  As  a trade  meas- 
ure alone,  not  to  speak  of  a humanitarian  one,  let  there 
be  more  missionaries, — especially  medical, — sent  out, 
and  do  not  hamper  them  by  confining  them  to  didactics; 
let  them  put  their  hands  to  anything  civilizing  for  the 
precarious  present. 

There  is  something  marvelously  authoritative  in  the 
clang  of  the  cantankerous  gong.  Sleepy  China,  and  even 
the  sport-pursuing  foreigner  outside  the  gates,  are  obe- 
dient in  an  instant.  Insistence  is  shown  by  the  rapidity 
of  the  strokes.  The  gong  saves  China  policemen.  It 
is  the  flare  of  the  short  sunset.  At  the  southern  gate 
of  one  of  the  ten  thousand  walled  cities  of  dragon  land, 
one  hundred  strokes  are  rapidly  struck  by  the  watchman. 
Every  one  becomes  his  brother’s  policeman,  and  shouts 
to  his  neighbor  to  hurry.  There  is  a pause.  One  hun- 
dred more  strokes  are  rained  upon  the  gong,  in  the  fort 
which  is  built  upon  the  wall  over  the  gate,  where  the  in- 
struments of  the  bonzes  indicate  that  the  sun  has  gone 
down.  Not  all  the  gate  towers  are  beautiful,  Peking’s 
having  little  curl  to  the  cornices  and  the  structures  being 
too  heavy.  The  Chien  Mun  gate,  which  the  expedi- 
tionary force  blew  up  in  1900,  was  as  plain  as  a gunny 
godown.  At  Mukden,  and  indeed  the  deeper  you  go 
into  Manchuria  and  Mongolia,  the  more  the  artistic 
wanes  and  the  colder,  older  and  sadder  the  forts  and 
everything  else  look.  At  Hang-chow,  the  gates  are  too 
low  and  long  for  such  heavy  walls,  though  the  cor- 
nices have  the  grace  that  you  expect  in  the  happier 
south.  But  at  Kialing  Fu  is  a beautiful  gate-fort  of 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE  105 

splendid  proportions,  with  lofty  sweep  to  the  cornices, 
grace  in  the  lattice  work,  and  adornment  in  the  frieze. 
The  farther  you  go  up  the  Yangtze,  a kindlier  sun  and 
sweeter  air  warm  the  heart  and  foster  into  flower  the 
artistic  dreams  of  the  native  architect.  The  two  story 
guard-house  on  the  wall  over  the  low  grim  north  gate 
of  Canton,  is  more  ponderous  than  beautiful  however. 
One  exception  to  the  general  stern  style  of  the  north  is 
the  chaste  and  truly  delightful  pentagonal  gate  with 
frieze  through  the  Great  Wall  at  Nankow. 

Within  a few  minutes  after  the  clangs  of  the  last  one 
hundred  strokes  have  died  away,  the  crowd, — all  but  the 
thief  who  is  greasing  his  body  and  filling  his  rolled-up 
queue  with  needles  so  you  can  not  hold  him  by  the  tail, — 
has  divided  between  those  who  will  remain  in  the  stone 
sheds  among  the  vegetable  and  rice  terraces,  or  stay 
within  the  clamorous  city,  where  half  the  traders  keep 
shop  (not  in  their  hats  for  they  have  none),  in  their 
umbrellas.  The  ponderous  iron-bound  gate  is  dragged 
shut  with  much  laughter,  chaffing  and  jeers  at  the  gate- 
men,  who  with  earnest  faces,  excitement  of  manner,  and 
shouting  san  (get  out  of  the  way),  drop  the  long 
fastening  bar  into  its  socket.  The  clamps  are  padlocked 
with  enormous  quaint  brass  locks,  which  any  peasant 
could  pick  with  a rice-hook.  The  piratically  inclined 
have  been  known  to  use  a little  palm  oil  to  lubricate  their 
exit,  after  the  law  had  posted  its  warder.  Outside  the 
gates,  Leong  has  been  jostled  by  Cheong.  They  drop 
their  bamboo  poles  and  baskets ; rush  at  each  other,  plant 
their  feet  in  each  other’s  stomachs  and  tug  at  each 
other’s  queues.  Nearly  every  southern  Chinese  is 
subject  to  enlargement  of  the  spleen,  and  therefore  the 
western  method  of  fisticuffs  has  fortunately  not  been 


io6 


THE  CHINESE 


adopted.  The  gate  of  a city  is  considered  as  holy  as  a 
temple,  and  it  is  sacrilege  to  paste  posters  upon  it.  If 
you  would  not  invite  bad  fortune,  you  must  leave  a city 
by  a different  gate  from  the  one  by  which  you  entered 
it.  It  is  the  hurried  close  of  the  race-meeting  outside 
the  northwest  walls  of  Peking  in  May.  The  evening 
shadows  are  growing  longer  beneath  the  thirteen  story 
Buddhist  monastery,  and  the  roofs  of  the  Taoist  temple. 
Some  one  announces  that  it  is  about  time  for  the  gongs 
of  Peking  to  sound  their  warning.  The  Chinese  begin 
to  race  home  on  foot.  The  last  races  are  hurried,  and 
the  mafoos  hardly  wait  for  their  badges.  Foreigners 
mounted  on  mules,  Mongol  ponies,  and  India  breds;  in 
chairs,  in  Peking  springless  carts,  in  ’rickishas,  and  on 
foot, — all  vanish  into  the  advancing  cloud  of  loess  dust, 
which  swallows  them,  and  move  on  to  the  Anting  gate 
just  before  it  is  closed  for  the  night.  Thus  far  at  least 
has  our  Occidental  in  exile  become  orientalized. 

Half  of  the  false  hair  used  in  America  and  Europe 
is  gathered  in  China.  It  is  not  uncommon  for  the  river 
pirates  who  infest  the  delta  about  Canton,  to  burst  upon 
a village,  and  after  kidnapping  for  ransom  all  they  can 
conveniently  convoy,  to  cut  off  every  other  queue  they 
can  lay  hold  of.  Rats  are  eaten  by  the  extremely 
ignorant  in  the  superstition  that  the  queue  will  grow 
longer.  In  Shansi,  human  hair  combings  are  collected 
and  woven  at  home  into  large  over-socks  for  winter  use. 

The  queue  fills  not  only  a roll  of  honor,  but  some- 
times comes  in  for  dishonor.  On  a March  evening  not 
long  ago,  at  Fat  Shan  on  the  delta  of  the  Pearl,  the 
silk  shop  of  my  friend  Tai  Cheung,  on  Sui  Tsun  street, 
was  attacked  at  night  in  back  and  front.  Four  pirates, 
with  stones  tied  to  the  ends  of  bamboos,  broke  a hole 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


107 


through  the  adobe  wall  at  the  back  and  entered.  The 
eight  fokis  (shop  tenders)  who  were  sleeping  on  the 
premises,  rushed  to  the  front  bars  to  escape  from  the 
shooting  in  the  rear.  There  sixteen  other  desperadoes 
alarmed  them  with  torches  and  drove  them  back.  The 
robbers  herded  the  fokis  in  a corner,  where  they  were 
all  tied,  queues  together,  with  wire  to  a post,  where 
these  inglorious  Celestial  Samsons  were  later  found  by 
the  amused  villagers.  To  complete  the  consternation  of 
the  poor  fokis,  the  thieves  exploded  bamboo  bombs,  and 
with  their  arms  full  of  bolts  of  silk,  and  shouting  San 
fP  (scatter)  to  one  another,  they  safely  decamped. 
There  are  also  bands  who  make  a specialty  of  robbing 
the  mulberry  trees.  A company  recently  stole  upon  the 
Shun  Tak  community  near  Canton,  with  shears,  ladders, 
and  bags.  The  villagers  awoke  to  find  their  only 
wealth,  the  lusang  trees,  denuded  of  every  branch  and 
leaf.  It  is  pretty  hard  to  prove  ownership  of  a mulberry 
leaf,  but  the  worms  of  the  adjoining  Sai  Kwan  district 
proved  to  be  exceedingly  productive  that  season, — so 
that  the  Shun  Tak  people  retain  their  suspicions  for  a 
retaliatory  raid  next  season. 

Some  of  the  rich  unquestionably  eat  fried  silkworm 
grubs  which  are  fed  on  oak  leaves,  and  some  of  the  poor 
eat  non-poisonous  snakes,  cats  and  dogs.  The  last  men- 
tioned are  sold  slyly  even  in  the  British  colony  of  Hong- 
Kong,  but  this  taste  is  not  unknown  in  Europe.  The 
price  of  dog  flesh  in  Hamburg,  on  July  sixteenth,  was 
quoted  at  sixty  pfennigs.  In  the  cities  of  Cassel  and 
Chemnitz  last  year  fourteen  hundred  dogs,  and  through- 
out the  German  Empire  about  eight  thousand  dogs  in  the 
same  period,  were  slaughtered  for  food  purposes. 

Au  Yang  Kang,  a butcher,  recently  made  unblushing 


io8 


THE  CHINESE 


application  to  the  Sanitary  Board  of  the  British  colony 
of  Hong-Kong,  for  “ permission  to  sell  deer,  snakes, 
cats  and  dogs  for  food  in  the  petitioner’s  shop  on 
Temple  Street,  Yaumati,”  on  the  Chinese  mainland. 
Their  dog  is  stockier  than  the  Esquimaux,  which  it  most 
resembles.  Its  plumed  tail  is  curled  well  up  on  its  back, 
and  it  has  a noble  frill  and  mane.  The  color  is  either 
solid  black  or  solid  tan.  Those  of  black  tongue  and 
black  mouth  are  considered  the  purest  in  lineage.  The 
black  dog  is  preferred  when  used  for  food.  Its  char- 
acteristics are  an  absolute  unfriendliness  to  every  one  ex- 
cept its  owner,  and  freedom  from  hydrophobia  even  in  so 
hot  a climate.  As  a watch-dog  it  has  no  superior,  never 
attacking  but  barking  like  an  irrepressible  string  of  fire- 
crackers. Its  power  in  the  shoulders  makes  it  a useful 
and  most  unique  adjunct  to  sail  and  man  in  propelling 
the  barrows  along  the  narrow,  raised,  country  paths. 

The  Chinese  seldom  build  oblong  mounds  over  their 
fens  (graves).  The  rich  of  the  southern  provinces 
adopt  the  conspicuous  horseshoe  brick  work,  in  the  toe 
of  which  the  urn  or  coffin  is  sealed.  These  spots  are 
chosen  for  the  view  they  afford,  which  is  an  important 
consideration  in  Fungslnii  geomancy.  The  poor  build 
merely  a cone  of  earth  over  the  urn,  and  into  this  is 
inserted  the  wooden  stick  with  its  black  letters.  The 
cemeteries  cover  a larger  area  than  the  cities  of  China, 
which  is  an  indisputable  visual  evidence  both  of  the  age 
of  the  country,  and  the  stability  of  its  customs.  Around 
the  mounds  beyond  the  Porta  Cerco  gate  at  Macao,  I 
have  seen  the  Heungshan  farmers  permit  their  water- 
buffaloes  to  crop  food.  Who  that  has  stood  on  Kwan 
Yin  Hill,  beyond  the  north  gate  of  Canton,  and  looked 
into  the  necropolis  of  tlie  ages  which  extends  up  the 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE  109 

acclivities  of  the  White  Cloud  Hills,  wide  as  the  eye  can 
sweep  beyond  the  walls,  can  for  a moment  feel  that  the 
living  speak  as  vastly  as  do  the  honored  dead  of  this 
city,  which  was  sending  out  funeral  processions  two  cen- 
turies before  Christ,  while  to-day  those  graves  now  being 
dug  are  for  the  bones  of  Kwangtung  men  who  died  in 
Africa,  Australia,  Panama,  Saghalien  and  Demarara, 
where  they  formed  the  advance  guard  of  our  occidental 
civilization.  Orientals  though  they  were  by  blood  and 
birth?  The  white  captains  of  steamers  who  are  known 
to  exercise  care  that  no  Chinese  emigrant  dying  en  route 
is  buried  at  sea,  are  remembered  by  the  guilds  at  Hong- 
Kong  with  handsome  silk  banners  testifying  to  their 
“ Honorable  Benevolence  ” so  truly  Confucian  in  prac- 
tice. 

In  the  first  part  of  April,  when  the  earth  and  air  is 
joyous  with  oriental  color,  the  hills  around  the  cities  are 
crowded  with  those  who  come  to  perform  pai  shan, 
or  worship  on  the  hills.  Five  foods  are  laid  at  the  tomb : 
duck,  goose,  fish,  fowl  and  pig.  Cousins  come  from  dis- 
tant points,  and  the  festival  is  really  their  Christmas  in 
the  sense  of  reunions,  rejoicing  and  feasts.  Part  of  the 
ceremony  is  called  Siu  Fan  Tai,  “sweeping  the  tomb” 
clean  of  leaves  and  dust  in  preparation  for  the  kowtow. 
The  worshiper  raises  up  his  voice,  invoking  his  ances- 
tor, and  declares:  “Lo,  I have  swept  thy  tomb.” 

But  the  heart  of  the  foreigner  is  touched  by  a closer 
chord  of  pity  for  his  own  exiles,  when  his  eye  beholds 
the  white  man’s  cemeteries  on  French  and  Dane’s  Islands 
in  the  Pearl  River. 

In  the  funeral  procession,  the  white  lotus  is  carried  as 
the  badge  of  mourning,  and  a sprig  of  growing  bamboo, 
to  signify  that  the  soul  sprouts  again  in  another  world 


no 


THE  CHINESE 


in  another  form.  Pretty  enough  for  any  faith!  The 
red  census  slips  on  each  side  of  the  door  are  taken 
down  for  a season,  and  white  ones  are  pasted  up. 
A white  lantern  instead  of  a gaudy  one  is  hung  out  at 
night.  White  cord  is  braided  in  the  queue.  Indeed,  if 
you  point  to  a funeral  procession  and  ask  a yokel  what  it 
is,  he  will  say  “ a white  affair.”  Two  conical  incense 
mounds  are  carried  on  a tray  to  be  burned ; they  are  called 
Chin  Shan  and  Yin  Shan  (gold  and  silver  mountains). 
No  procession  is  accorded  to  those  who  have  not  been 
married.  Such  are  hurried  to  the  grave  unescorted,  save 
by  the  two  melancholy  bearers  and  the  parents.  White 
cakes  are  taken  so  that  the  soul  of  the  deceased  may  in- 
hale their  fragrance.  The  priests  are  gowned  in  white. 
The  only  legitimate  widow,  (the  first),  wearing  white 
flowers  in  her  hair,  is  hurried  along,  led  by  a child.  She 
is  expected  to  cry  aloud,  and  should  seem  to  make  en- 
deavor to  break  from  the  throng,  so  as  to  commit  suicide 
in  faithful  grief.  Professional  mourners,  called  “ dogs 
of  the  devil,”  wear  white  sheets  over  their  shoul- 
ders, weep  tears  and  howl  uninterruptedly,  except  when 
they  explode  us  Westerners  by  quickly  changing  to  a 
smile  and  nod  for  some  passing  acquaintance.  A white 
pall  is  thrown  over  the  coffin,  which  is  trotted  along  by 
two  or  four  bearers.  Arriving  at  the  grave,  the  bier  is 
approached  by  near  friends,  who  cal!  out  the  name  of  the 
dead.  Flowers  are  not  sent,  but  friends  contribute  ban- 
ners on  which  are  emblazoned  the  offices  and  virtues  of 
the  deceased. 

The  Chinese  are  always  dramatic.  There  is  a con- 
siderable stretch  between  the  sections.  This  is  intended 
to  magnify,  by  repeating,  the  impression,  so  that  the 
word  shall  be  passed  several  times  down  the  streets: 


Golf  in  the  Graveyard  of  the  Ages,  Canton,  South  China.  The  spot 
where  all  the  Chinese  of  America  state  in  their  wills 
that  their  bones  must  lie. 


Sheep  grazing  in  a graveyard  of  the  ])oor,  in  the  suhnrhs  of  Peking. 
North  China.  Ancestor-worship  has  preserved  these  ceme- 
teries to  the  clans,  safe  from  intrusion  by  agricul- 
ture or  building  for  thousands  of  years.  Two 
topes  to  dead  llamas  in  background. 


Canal  between  native  city  and  .'^hameen  Island,  where  foreigner 
live.  Canton.  .South  Chimi. 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


III 


“It  is  Hip  Tong  — it  is  Hip  Tong  — it  is  Hip  Tong, 
who  is  released  to  his  ancestors.”  A wooden  tab- 
let with  the  name  of  the  deceased  is  stuck  in  the  pot  of 
ashes  in  the  toy  spirit  house.  In  this  tablet  resides  one 
of  the  three  souls  of  the  man.  Pirates  steal  these  sacred 
tablets  for  ransom.  The  Imperial  family  use  blue  for 
anniversary  mourning,  though  white  is  de  rigeur  for  first 
mourning.  The  largest  grave  section  in  the  south  is  at 
Chek  Wan,  situated  on  one  of  the  branches  of  the  Pearl 
Delta,  near  Canton.  Excursions  are  run  by  steamboat  in 
April,  and  one  hundred  thousand  Chinese  from  Hong- 
Kong  and  Canton  make  the  pilgrimage.  The  festival 
is  a religious  one  and  is  called  by  the  Hakkas  Tsing 
Ming,  or  “ saluting  of  the  hill.”  The  exact  date  is  set 
by  the  emperor,  who  thus  comes  into  intimate  father- 
hood with  the  poorest  of  his  people,  his  office  as  priest 
often  protecting  his  weakness  as  king.  The  Board  (Pu) 
of  Rites,  realizing  however  the  inadequate  means  of  rural 
transportation,  and  the  inconvenience  and  sanitary  danger 
of  throwing  a crowd  of  scores  of  thousands  into  one 
cemetery  on  a certain  day,  permits  pilgrims  a latitude  of 
two  days  before  and  after  the  official  day,  to  pay  their 
worship  at  the  tombs  of  their  ancestors.  A burial  in 
the  small  villages  near  Hong-Kong,  like  Lyee-moon  and 
Ngan  Kok,  costs  twenty  cents  excluding  the  coffin,  and 
where  the  body  is  sculled  to  a cemetery  a mile  across 
the  bay,  the  cost  is  two  dollars  and  a half.  The  desecra- 
tion of  a grave  is  a capital  offense.  The  mausoleums  of 
the  rich,  with  their  terraces  and  Yunnan  marble  stairs,  are 
even  more  striking  and  costly  that  what  our  own  ceme- 
teries have  to  show.  A native  Avill  not  pass  a cemetery 
at  night,  without  a lighted  lantern.  The  Mohammedan 
Chinese  of  Yunnan  have  a unique  custom  of  whitewash- 


II2 


THE  CHINESE 


ing  their  graves,  which  point  south.  In  Shensi  remain 
evidences  of  great  dome-like  mounds  which  are  either  the 
graves  of  emperors,  or  the  victims  of  famine  from 
drought  or  flood.  So  you  may  guess  whether  one  man 
or  fifty  thousand  lie  under  each  mound.  Knowing  what 
I do  of  famines  in  China,  I prefer  to  believe  in  the  larger 
number  under  each  mound. 

One  of  the  saddest  sights  in  the  world  is  a clan’s 
charity  cemetery.  This  is  walled  around,  in  contrast  to 
the  ant-hill  graves  of  the  vast  open  hillside.  Against 
the  middle  of  one  wall  is  a noble  shrine.  The  chasteness 
of  the  design  is  not  surpassed  by  any  architecture;  walls 
strong  as  the  Egyptian,  a colored  tile  roof  with  heavy 
eaves,  a fagade  pure  as  the  Doric.  There  is  only  the 
curved  line  of  the  ridge  to  suggest  what  is  characteris- 
tically Chinese.  Receptacles  are  made  for  the  deposit 
of  prayer  papers,  spirit  food  and  incense,  the  rites  being 
similar  to  the  early  Greek.  The  melancholy  view  is  of 
the  stern  field  of  death,  with  its  closely  placed  conical 
mounds  which  are  built  over  the  urns.  At  the  foot  of 
the  center  path  is  the  one  stone,  with  the  name  of  the 
clan  and  the  purpose  of  its  charity  for  its  poor  members. 
There  is  not  a tree  or  a plant  in  the  vast  enclosure ; only 
the  silhouette  of  the  white  and  green  altar  to  the  gods 
of  the  clan,  which  has  not  moved  from  its  countryside 
for  thousands  of  years.  The  baby  towers,  about  which 
so  many  misstatements  have  been  made,  are  erected  by 
clan  charity  to  “ save  the  face,”  that  is  to  say,  to  keep 
the  poor  parent’s  pride  from  the  humility  of  formally 
asking  charity  from  the  clan.  When  the  child  dies,  the 
parent  drops  its  body  in  the  tower  of  silence,  where  it  is 
taken  charge  of  by  the  clan  officials,  and  a proper  funeral 
is  given  it,  the  parent  mixing  in  the  retinue,  and  it  is 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


113 

not  altogether  unknown  whose  child  it  is.  There  is  a 
great  deal  said  of  children  being  strangled  and  thrown 
in  the  towers,  but  there  is  probably  as  much  parental 
affection  in  China  as  elsewhere.  In  contrast  with  this 
austerity  are  the  elaborate  topes  to  dead  Lamas,  erected 
in  Shansi,  Pechili  and  Thibet. 

Much  has  also  been  written  of  the  dangerous  habit  of 
leaving  bodies  above  ground,  for  it  certainly  is  very  com- 
mon to  see  coffins  scattered  upon  an  open  lot  for  months, 
waiting  for  the  lucky  burial  day  (Fungshui),  and  the 
exact  spot  that  the  geomancers  are  to  choose.  But  as 
the  coffins  are  from  six  to  eight  inches  thick,  the  joints 
cemented,  and  the  body  placed  in  lime,  they  are  as  harm- 
less above  ground  as  under  it,  and  one  never  hears  of  pes- 
tilence resulting  from  the  custom,  except  in  a hurried 
tourist’s  sketch.  But  China  is  now  establishing  news- 
papers, and  will  prove  the  truth  of  what  is  written  about 
her. 

In  the  futile  ostentation  of  pride  and  the  contumely 
borne  by  poverty,  the  Chinese  are  not  exempt  from  our 
own  experiences.  In  the  ward  of  the  coffin  makers  be- 
neath the  walls  of  Canton,  near  the  Five  Story  pagoda, 
is  a Buddhist  sanctuary  for  the  dead.  According  to  the 
rent  paid,  a coffin  and  room  are  hired,  and  emblematic 
food  for  the  spirit  and  appeasing  incense  for  the  con- 
trary spirits,  are  offered  every  day  by  the  monks.  Some 
of  the  coffins  like  that  of  the  Viceroy  of  Fu-kien  or  the 
Tartar  General  Chung’s  which  all  retain  the  convex  shape 
of  the  tree,  display  the  most  gorgeous  yellow  lacquer  ever 
executed.  As  long  as  the  family  of  the  deceased  remains 
wealthy,  this  display  is  the  envy  of  the  townspeople. 
When  poppied  time  passes,  and  the  fees  are  not  paid,  an- 
other body  is  installed  in  both  coffin  and  room.  But  this 


THE  CHINESE 


114 

is  exactly  the  custom  followed  in  our  French  and  Span- 
ish cities,  as  in  the  brick  pile  of  rented  tombs  at  St. 
Roch’s,  New  Orleans;  in  the  tiers  which  adjoin  the  old 
pit  of  ejected  human  bones  at  the  Cristobal  Colon  Ceme- 
tery at  Havana,  and  in  the  long  white  alleys  at  Barcelona, 
where  trouble  is  not  taken  fully  to  obliterate  the  names 
of  the  defaulting  tenant  before  the  new  initials  are  painted 
on  the  door.  A foreigner  (and  I have  known  a mean 
humorist  to  do  it  to  sell  his  wares)  who  makes  it  known 
to  the  mandarin  and  native  community  that  he  has  bought 
his  grave  plot  in  sacred  China,  at  once  secures  irresistible 
influence  and  affection  from  a people  who  see  in  this 
act  the  highest  proof  of  a feeling  of  brotherhood  with 
them. 

The  rivers  of  China  bear  an  unusual  alluvial  richness  to 
the  seas.  Where  America  has  one  mile  of  river,  China 
has  ten.  The  deltas  and  fishing  banks  around  Canton 
and  Woosung  are  feeding  grounds  for  innumerable  shoals 
of  fish.  The  fish  as  they  are  caught  are  thrown  into 
flooded  compartments  (the  Chinese  invented  the  compart- 
ment boat  really  for  fishing  purposes),  and  sold  alive  in 
the  markets  of  Hong-Kong.  Your  comprador  learns  to 
judge  by  the  dorsal  fin  as  he  chooses  your  dinner,  and 
your  coolie  dangles  the  struggling  pomfret,  garoupa,  or 
mullet  from  a grass  thong  as  he  marches  behind  your 
’rickisha.  The  natives  too  often  insist  on  the  scales  be- 
ing scraped,  while  life  is  still  pulsing  in  the  victim.  For 
transportation  inland,  great  sunfish,  perch  and  ling  are 
salted  and  sun-dried.  The  Chinese  is  nauseated  by  no 
degree  of  piscatorial  decomposition,  but  he  gets  a good 
deal  of  leprosy,  according  to  some  critics,  from  the  dried 
fish  indulgence.  In  the  higher  country,  northwest  from 
Canton,  the  peasants  in  the  spawning  season  pull  the 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


115 

reeds,  on  which  the  eggs  hang,  from  the  rivers,  and  throw 
them  into  pools.  In  this  way  their  ponds  are  stocked 
with  carp.  The  silt  of  the  Chu  and  Si  Rivers  has  built 
a vast  fishing  shoal  about  famous  old  Macao.  This  em- 
porium of  the  far  East  during  the  fifteenth  century  lies 
now  like  a stranded  ship,  melancholy  in  isolation. 

Magni  nominis  umbra”  The  red  land  dragon  has 
clutched  her  from  the  grasp  of  the  green  sea  dragon.  In 
twenty-five  years,  seventy  million  metric  tons  of  alluvial 
deposit  have  been  silted  around  the  doomed  port.  Her 
custom-house  entries  of  clearances  for  Europe  suddenly 
closed  sixty  years  ago.  No  fitter  place  could  be  chosen 
than  this  blue-walled  city,  for  a Goldsmith  of  the  Sea  to 
sing  the  stanzas  of  a “ Deserted  Harbor.” 

The  widest  beach  in  the  world  is  the  famous  half  moon 
beach  between  Ke  Tae  and  Cacilhas.  One  can  walk  out 
two  miles  at  low  tide.  On  the  silver  strand  at  high  tide, 
native  fishermen  dry  their  nets,  which  they  have  dyed  with 
an  infusion  of  mangrove  bark  or  gambier,  to  preserve 
them.  Others  are  poling  their  way  along  a net,  and  dart- 
ing into  the  water  at  the  end  of  a bamboo,  an  inverted  half 
cocoanut,  to  frighten  the  fish  into  the  net.  Tremendous 
vigor  is  exercised  in  the  animating  scene.  In  the  fish 
market,  below  the  three-storied  stone  building  which  has  a 
picturesque  fourth  story  of  bamboo,  on  the  Inner  Praya, 
you  can  purchase  a dififerent  species  of  fish  every  day  of 
the  year,  brought  from  the  feeding  shallows  around  Joao 
and  Lapa,  particularly  the  delicious  samli,  and  among 
the  others,  hammer-headed  shark,  electric  torpedo,  cuttle, 
gorgeous  parrot,  red  sturgeon,  eels,  and  anchovies. 
While  there  are  no  lobsters  in  oriental  waters,  the  Lung 
Hai,  or  giant  crawfish,  affords  a good  substitute,  and  ef- 
forts are  now  being  made  to  transplant  it  to  the  American 


ii6 


THE  CHINESE 


side  of  the  Pacific.  For  river  fishing,  both  cormorants 
and  otters  are  trained, — the  latter,  however,  only  being 
used  to  drive  the  fish  into  the  nets.  Prawns  are  caught 
in  vast  quantities  all  the  way  from  Canton  to  Hong- 
Kong,  along  the  Ladrone  and  Lantao  Islands,  and  even 
back  of  Stonecutter’s  Island  in  Hong-Kong  Bay,  and  the 
paste  is  shipped  to  European  purveyors.  At  the  green 
and  slippy  old  stone  wharf  in  front  of  the  Harbor  Of- 
fice, Hong-Kong,  you  will  notice  the  black  oysters  of 
Amoy  and  Fu-chau  being  landed,  but  don’t  eat  them  if 
you  value  your  life,  except  in  December,  when  they  are  as 
delicious  as  the  dark  oysters  of  New  Orleans.  You  will 
notice  that  the  bones  of  the  pike  are  green  and  the 
chickens’  bones  dark.  There  is  no  doubt  that  the  fish, 
feeding  in  the  estuaries  of  the  Canton  and  West  Riv- 
ers, are  affected  by  the  mineral  matter,  in  the  loess, 
which  the  rivers  carry  down  from  the  heart  of  the 
country. 

If  forests  were  planted  at  the  headwaters  to  stay  the 
floods,  and  equalize  the  flow  during  all  the  year,  China 
would  add  to  her  wealth  in  soil  half  a billion  dollars  a 
year.  But  there  was  an  instance  where  a sudden  increase 
in  the  wealth  of  the  agriculturists  of  a land,  troubled  in 
other  directions,  made  possible  a revolution,  as  in  the  days 
preceding  Cromwell,  and  there  might  be  a repetition  of 
this  condition  here.  As  soon  as  the  American  western 
states  fifteen  years  ago  threw  off  their  farm  mortgages, 
which  had  been  oppressing  them  for  twenty  years,  the 
propaganda  which  flowered  in  Roosevelt’s  criticisms  be- 
gan for  the  elimination  of  the  usurious  oppression  and 
discriminating  legislation  from  which  they  had  suffered 
during  those  “ twenty  years  of  Egypt.” 

In  metal  and  wood  work,  the  native  artisan  sticks  to 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE  117 

his  bow  drill.  He  draws  the  cord  to  and  fro  with  effect- 
iveness, but  at  a painful  waste  of  energy,  as  he  applies  the 
weight  of  his  chest  for  pressure.  The  Chinese  are  en- 
tirely without  steam  circular  saw  mills.  The  great  logs 
of  teak  which  come  from  Siam,  and  pine  from  Oregon 
and  the  Yalu,  are  tilted  up,  while  a man  standing  on  the 
log,  and  one  crouching  under  it,  push  a hand-saw.  I 
have  seen  concrete  double  walled  buildings,  six  stories 
high,  and  taking  up  a square,  being  erected  in  Hong- 
Kong,  with  the  sawyers  alongside  preparing  the  teak 
beams  in  this  ancient  and  picturesque  fashion.  The  Eng- 
lish architects  brought  boilers  out,  but  they  always  have 
and  always  will  grow  wheezy  in  the  hands  of  the  Sawyers’ 
Guild,  even  in  treaty  ports.  Joiners  use  a saw  having 
a blade  fifteen  inches  long,  and  widest  at  the  end,  where 
it  measures  five  inches  across.  It  tapers  toward  a bam- 
boo handle.  One  edge  is  set  for  cross-cut,  and  the  other 
for  rip.  The  dust  is  drawn  with  the  upward  stroke, 
which  is  the  thousand  and  first  tiring  instance,  given  by 
the  telescope  man,  that  “ everything  is  opposite  in  China.” 
Smooth  and  able  racing  boats  are  built  at  about  half  what 
they  would  cost  in  America,  and  the  clerk  who  in  Eng- 
land was  elate  with  a whirl  in  the  Tupenny  Tube  and 
a ’bus  ride  to  Hampstead  Heath,  here  blossoms  out  as  a 
boat  owner  in  his  second  year  of  indenture.  The  Royal 
Hong-Kong  Yacht  Squadron  turns  out  a respectable  fleet 
of  thirty  half-raters,  and  several  two-stickers  and  yawls, 
all  erected,  and  many  of  them  designed,  by  Chinese  boat 
builders  like  Ah  Kee.  In  the  cup-like  harbor,  set  about 
with  the  lofty  Hong-Kong  and  Kowloon  blue  ranges,  the 
dipping  sails  and  bubbling  scuppers  of  the  fleet  make  a 
picture  a little  more  animating  than  porcelain,  and  cer- 
tainly dearer  to  the  exile,  because  it  has  that  touch  of 


ii8 


THE  CHINESE 


home  which  made  Fong,  the  Chinese  emigrants’  poet,  say: 
“ They  love  home  most  who  never  have  one.” 

The  meal  of  the  Chinese  bon  vivant  (the  effete  treaty 
ports  have  them  all)  begins  with  samschu,  rice  wine, 
served  hot.  The  cups  must  be  inverted  with  some  em- 
phasis, as  they  are  emptied.  The  cup  is  not  lifted  by 
the  fingers,  but  is  rather  placed  in  the  hollow  of  the 
hand,  and  then  raised.  The  wine  contains  only  fifteen 
per  cent,  of  alcohol.  Soups,  which  close  the  repast,  are 
of  the  delightful  birds’  nest,  brought  from  Moscos  Island 
in  Burmah,  sweet  lotus,  fungus,  sprouted  bean,  and 
pigeons’  egg.  Between  are  served  Sam  See  Chee,  a 
hash  of  shark,  pheasant,  chicken  and  bamboo  shoots; 
yauk,  a jelly  of  pounded  rice  and  oil;  wo  ap,  bone- 
less dried  duck  which  has  an  Egyptian  taste  of  mummy 
wrappings;  Mut  kirn  ghet,  a preparation  of  Chinese 
golden  lime;  boh  loh,  made  with  pineapple;  lichee 
gon,  the  Imperial  nuts  with  a raisin  taste;  sedge  root 
and  water  chestnuts.  Raw  fish  and  legs  of  frogs,  called 
Ye  Sang,  taken  from  the  flooded  rice  swamps,  are 
not  infrequently  eaten,  now  that  ice  is  obtainable  to  make 
them  appeal  to  the  gourmet.  Eggs  are  preserved  in  a 
paste  of  saltpetre,  soy  and  earth  for  periods  so  long  that 
they  are  blackened  with  their  sulphur,  and  taste  like  our 
high  school  boy’s  experiment  in  sulphurated  hydrogen. 
In  Che-kiang  Province  hams  are  pickled  in  soy  sauce. 
Hoi  Shunt,  or  sea  slug  from  Korean  waters,  is  first 
dried,  then  steamed,  and  served  with  pigeon.  Cakes  are 
made  of  fried  grasshoppers.  Of  all  gastronomical  de- 
lights to  the  foreigner  is  the  Chinese  shad  or  satnli 
of  the  Canton  estuary,  a fish  half  between  our  shad  and 
pompano  in  taste.  Nearly  equal  as  a prandial  delicacy 
is  the  pill  fan  yu,  or  white  rice  fish,  which  is  breaded. 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


1 19 

Your  army  officer  at  the  club  will  call  for  salmon ; he 
means  polynemus.  It  is  like  our  salmon  in  taste  and  is 
the  only  pink  fish  in  the  far  East. 

Oranges  are  skilfully  opened,  filled  with  various  colored 
jellies,  carefully  sealed  and  brought  to  the  table  again  an 
naturcl.  The  dwarf  kin-kew,  or  golden  orange,  popu- 
larly known  as  the  kurnquat,  is  preserved  whole,  and  is  a 
delicacy  which  immediately  makes  you  declare  you  even- 
tually will  love  the  country  despite  much.  The  tart  loquat 
tastes  and  looks  like  a cross  between  a grape  and  an 
orange.  The  green,  curling  fern  and  seaweed  from 
Korea,  are  prepared  as  we  serve  spinach,  and  plum  ker- 
nels are  fried  in  oil.  Tea  is  drunk  as  the  Germans  in  the 
East  handle  cocktails;  i.  e.,  the  cups  are  raised  in  salute 
and  drained  simultaneously.  A guest  receives  his  cup 
with  both  hands.  Should  an  invited  guest  be  absent 
through  illness,  the  meal  is  sent  to  his  house.  Among  the 
gifts  is  a beautiful  basket,  which  is  filled  with  rice,  and  a 
selected  branch  of  arbor-vitse  or  pine  is  inserted  to  imitate 
a potted  tree,  beneath  the  branches  of  which  nuts  and 
fruits  are  spread  on  the  white  ground. 

A Chinese  never  takes  his  politeness  humorously. 
Therefore  I have  not  entered  the  following  anecdote 
among  the  humorous  paragraphs.  Their  unlucky  num- 
ber is  fourteen.  A host  found  himself,  because  of  dec- 
linations, with  thirteen  guests  at  his  table.  To  relieve 
his  consternation,  Li  Chong  spoke  forth : “ Never 

mind,  I shall  be  the  one  who  will  keep  his  drum  head 
slack  in  patience;  from  sweetmeat  to  soup  I shall  not 
eat  at  all,  and  therefore  I am  not  here.”  Native  gentle- 
men generally  hire  for  their  dinner  parties,  a large  restau- 
rant, or  club,  which  has  facilities  for  histrionic 
presentations.  Sometimes  these  festivities  last  two  days. 


120 


THE  CHINESE 


and  the  bill  includes  cost  of  lanterns,  presents  to  bonzes, 
and  ’rickisha  hire.  A man’s  love  for  his  women  folk  is 
proved  by  the  number  of  times  he  sends  “ regrets  ” to  a 
banquet,  for  the  meal  comes  home.  Hats  are  worn 
throughout.  They  are  generally  silk  skull  caps,  to  pro- 
tect the  shaven  heads.  Melon  and  sunflower  seeds,  and 
green  cayenne  pods  are  continually  passed  to  the  company 
of  singing  girls,  who  come  to  recite  and  dance,  if  the 
banquet  is  an  official  one.  Cassia,  mushrooms,  fish  gills, 
pheasant,  partridge,  snipe,  and  reed-birds  in  abundance, 
prawns,  carambola  fruit,  almond  custard,  orange  wine, 
steamed  sharks’  fins,  chicken  cooked  with  rice  wine,  gin- 
ger, soy,  sesamum,  peanut  oil  and  herbs, — are  all  drawn 
upon  by  these  versatile  cooks  in  preparing  their  menus, 
especially  when  a foreigner  is  to  be  invited.  Whole  roast 
pigs  and  hares  are  brought  on  gilded,  just  as  was  the 
Milanese  custom  in  the  fourteenth  century.  The  meal 
ends  with  a draft  of  hot  chook  (rice  soup),  and  a 
towel,  dipped  in  hot  water,  is  drawn  across  the  face.  Hot 
as  is  the  climate,  its  lassitude  seems  to  create  a craving 
for  hot  foods.  The  foreigner  probably  over-indulges  in 
spiced  Indian  chutneys  and  curries,  and  the  native  in  the 
betel-pepper  leaf. 

So  much  of  the  imported  liquors  and  comestibles  for 
the  white  man’s  consumption  in  the  tropics  (canned 
goods,  claret,  beer,  champagne,  etc.)  are  preserved  by 
acids,  it  is  now  not  uncommon  to  see  in  the  papers  an 
advertisement  like  the  following:  “Tuborg  beer,  ten 

dollars  and  a half  Mexican,  forty-eight  quarts,  guaranteed 
free  from  salicylic  acid.”  Despite  the  discouragement, 
the  foreigner  in  the  treaty  port  does  not  seem  to  forsake 
foods  which  have  the  acid,  and  if  he  ever  returns  home  he 
brings  to  his  physician  a stomach  as  useless  as  a sponge. 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


I2I 


Ice  is  now  fully  appreciated  in  the  household  menage,  and 
at  Ningpo  the  heavily  thatched  ice-houses  are  conspicuous 
along  the  river  front.  At  Hong-Kong,  of  course,  the  ice 
is  made  by  machinery.  If  your  native  cook  gets  a fowl 
which  he  believes  will  be  a tough  problem,  he  hangs  it 
among  the  papaw’s  branches  over  night,  in  the  belief  that 
the  exhalation  from  the  leaves  will  have  a mollifying 
effect.  Few  Chinese  comestibles  are  immersed  in  the 
water  and  boiled.  They  are  placed  in  perforated  vessels 
above  the  water  and  steamed.  We  who  are  used  to  the 
pasty  manner  in  which  our  cooks  destroy  the  beauty  of 
boiled  rice,  will  be  surprised  to  notice  this  article  of  food 
cooked  on  the  meanest  sampan  in  a manner  to  keep  each 
grain  light,  separate  and  dry  to  handle.  The  rice  is  made 
appetizing  by  taking  with  it  portions  of  kumchi,  a sort 
of  sauerkraut.  Economy  in  fuel  and  in  the  use  of  the  chop 
sticks  have  created  the  custom  of  cooking  meats  only 
when  they  are  cut  up  in  small  pieces.  When  one  has 
eaten  heartily,  and  the  affable  host  inquires  if  the  meal 
has  been  sufficient,  it  is  quite  polite  to  use  the  idiom; 
“ My  stomach  is  as  tight  as  a marshall’s  drum  head.” 
Spartans,  too,  are  they  on  occasion,  for  they  have  a 
proverb : “ He  only  is  a man  who  can  exist  on  petsai 

stalks.”  Outside  of  the  treaty  ports,  beef  is  a flesh  un- 
tasted by  even  the  rich  Chinese,  because  one  hash  would 
cost  as  much  as  the  whole  animal.  The  poor  could  not 
afford  to  pay  the  price ; the  few  well-to-do  in  the  village 
might  not  have  the  beef  appetite  on  the  one  day,  and  the 
owner  of  the  carcass  could  not  keep  over  what  he  did  not 
use,  as  ice  can  not  be  procured  inland.  A Chinese,  in  ex- 
pressing how  much  land  it  takes  to  support  a man,  says ; 
“ One  acre  for  six  mouths.” 

Where  we  raise  whisky  and  tobacco  smugglers,  the 


122 


THE  CHINESE 


Chinese  discover  opium  and  salt  evaders  of  the  Imperial 
Customs.  First  a pirate  at  Canton;  then  a salt  smuggler 
farther  up  the  Pearl,  is  Ng  Po’s  descent  to  civilization, 
for  later  we  shall  find  him  buying  out  a degree  and  a 
squeeze  mandarin-ship,  say  on  the  West  River  (now  be- 
come the  most  notorious  pirate  waters  of  the  world), 
not  too  far  from  his  former  haunts,  if  he  ever  wants  or 
needs  to  return  to  them.  Visitors  to  Canton  and  Macao 
will  recall  the  well  built  British  river-boats,  Heung- 
sJian,  Fatshan,  and  Honam,  and  the  Chinese  built 
Tai  On,  with  thousands  of  coolies  battened  like  cattle 
in  the  ’tween  decks  under  bars;  the  barred  ports;  and  the 
uniformed  Sikh  and  Portuguese  guards,  bristling  with 
rifles,  bayonets  and  pistols,  parading  by  every  hatchway 
on  the  saloon  deck,  where  the  foreigner  is  accommodated. 
Glancing  up  at  the  pilot-house,  your  eye  is  met  by  a 
rack  of  glistening  rifles  at  the  quartermaster’s  back.  It 
used  to  be  quite  common  in  Cantonese  and  Macaense 
waters  for  Chinese  pirates  (they  are  nearly  always  natives 
of  turbulent  Kwangsi  Province,  and  have  aboriginal  blood 
in  their  veins)  to  come  aboard  as  passengers,  and  when 
the  vessel  had  got  under  the  lee  of  Lantao  Island,  to 
swarm  over  the  saloon  deck,  and  compel  the  quarter- 
master to  run  for  the  Ladrone  Islands,  or  into  the  hundred 
and  one  creeks  of  the  estuary  of  the  Sikiang,  where  the 
boat  was  robbed  and  perhaps  scuttled,  and  pursuit  as 
effective  as  following  quicksilver  uphill.  The  world  was 
first  startled  by  the  Namoa  tragedy  on  December  loth, 
1890.  A British  motor-boat  has  been  looted  within  the 
shadow  of  the  bund  at  Samshui.  The  American  launch 
Comet  was  boarded  in  1906  within  sight  of  the  guns  of 
Whompoa. 

Only  lately  at  Lapa  Island,  across  Macao’s  inner  har- 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


123 


bor,  three  hundred  pirates  withstood  government  troops 
at  Naiwan  Mun.  The  quaint  unpainted  junks  of  Macao 
all  carry  old-fashioned  cannon  in  the  stern  (they  mean 
to  run  while  they  fight  for  it),  and  stinkpots  (bamboo 
fuse  grenades).  It  is  hard  to  tell  when  the  marauders 
are  pirates  and  when  government  troops,  and  when  the 
Chinese  are  criticized  concerning  this  delinquency  in 
patriotism,  they  ask  us  where  in  our  own  civilization, 
American  as  well  as  Russian,  notorious  detective  or- 
ganizations draw  the  line,  when  receipts  are  low,  be- 
tween blackmail  which  they  manufacture,  and  crime 
which  they  pursue.  As  the  steamers  from  Wuchow 
come  down  the  Rhine  of  China,  the  Sikiang,  they 
are  often  fired  upon  from  the  sorghum  brakes  by  these 
marauders,  who  wait  until  the  native  and  foreign  gun- 
boats, like  the  United  States  monitor  Monadnock,  are 
out  of  echo.  Some  years  it  has  been  necessary  to  convoy 
merchantmen  with  the  two  British,  two  French,  one  Ger- 
man, and  one  American  gunboats  which  make  headquar- 
ters at  Hong-Kong.  Underwriters  are  declining  risks  on 
the  river.  It  is  now  proposed  to  equip  the  gunboats  and 
merchantmen  with  Marconi,  and  allow  Robert  Bredon’s 
Customs  Service  to  police  the  river  with  part  of  China’s 
new  navy,  transferred  for  that  purpose.  Only  during  the 
Viceroyalty  of  Li  Hung  Chang,  with  Cromwellian  sever- 
ity, has  the  Sikiang  (West  River)  been  safe  from  Can- 
ton to  Wuchow,  and  Hong-Kong  asserts  that  the  Kwang- 
tung  government  can,  if  they  desire  to,  police  the  Siki- 
ang as  satisfactorily  to  foreign  commerce  as  the  stern 
Hupeh  government  polices  the  Hun  River.  The  traveler 
on  the  West  River  ten  years  ago  will  recall  the  three  pirate 
chimneys  on  Spike  Hill,  just  past  the  old  capital  of  Shui 
Hing.  The  pirates  were  thrust  in  the  chimneys  heads 


124 


THE  CHINESE 


downward,  and  the  tops  were  bricked  in.  Canton  in- 
dulges in  a little  bit  of  ceremony  in  beheading  its  crim- 
inals, but  in  the  smaller  towns,  as  at  Wuchow,  the  pirate 
is  hastened  out  from  the  bar  to  the  hillside,  and  in  the 
presence  of  a few,  including  one  mandarin  on  a pony 
(which  must  be  turned  backward  for  superstition’s  sake), 
the  victim,  who  is  opiated,  is  made  to  kneel  while  his  feet 
are  tied;  a rope  is  put  around  his  neck,  and  when  the 
swordsman  is  ready,  the  neck  is  quickly  drawn  out ; there 
is  a flash  of  steel  and  all  is  over. 

It  must  be  remarked  that  the  irreconcilable  attitude  to 
the  foreigner,  so  noticeable  at  Canton,  has  been  fixed 
there  since  the  opium  war  of  1840,  and  the  pirate  attacks 
are  not  the  only  evidence  of  it.  The  desperation  of  pov- 
erty is  the  cause  of  the  pirates’  ranks  being  increased  in 
times  of  famine.  In  1906  at  Canton  the  silk  crop  failed, 
owing  to  unusual  floods,  and  the  tea  crop  on  the  hills  was 
also  poor,  because  fertilizer  was  not  brought  up  owing  to 
flooded  paths.  Cotton  yarn  dealers  failed  because  con- 
sumers could  not  pay  or  borrow.  Piracy  grew  stronger 
and  bolder,  and  the  Sainam  tragedy  on  July  13th,  where 
foreigners  lost  their  lives,  ensued.  The  pirates  brought 
five  narrow  snake-boats  alongside  for  an  hour,  to  take  off 
the  valuables.  The  marauders  burned  their  clothes  for- 
ward on  deck.  The  crews  of  the  snake-boats  were  also 
naked  and  painted,  all  for  the  purpose  of  outwitting 
identification.  The  Sainam  is  a'  pretty  little  stern 
wheeler  of  five  hundred  and  seventy  tons.  The  British 
minister  at  Peking,  incited  by  the  persistent  clamor  of 
Hong-Kong,  vigorously  demanded  the  transfer  of  Vice- 
roy Shum  from  Kwangtung  Province.  It  was  granted 
and  Chang  Jen  Chun  sent,  as  another  evidence  that  Hong- 
Kong  is  as  yet  master  over  growling  Canton  in  matters 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


125 


of  the  peace,  and  who  shall  say  she  will  not  some  day 
complete  her  ambition  by  purifying  Canton’s  debased  cur- 
rency and  sanitary  conditions,  and  expediting  her  railway 
building. 

As  piracy  of  this  sort  is  not  infrequent  as  near  Europe 
as  the  Straits  of  Bab-el-Mandeb,  unpoliced  China  can 
perhaps  be  treated  leniently,  for,  as  a rule,  she  furnishes 
more  spice  than  danger  to  travel,  so  far  as  the  foreigner 
is  concerned.  Who  is  there  who  would  not  rather  cross 
China  unaccompanied  than  brave  Turkey  with  a caval- 
cade? Only  as  long  ago  as  Buckingham’s  regime, 
piracy  in  English  waters  was  tolerated  for  a fee,  two 
hundred  and  forty-eight  ships  having  been  seized  be- 
tween Dover  and  Newcastle  in  one  year.  We  can  not 
condemn  Chinese  mandarins  and  their  civilization  of  this 
time,  without  condemning  English  statesmen,  judges  like 
Sir  Henry  Marten,  and  the  civilization  of  our  great- 
grandfathers’ time.  The  day  when  authority  will  walk 
with  modern  emphasis  and  frequency  up  and  down  the 
path  of  commerce  is  not  far  off,  even  in  so  vast  a country 
as  China.  She  has  first  been  gathering  money  for  light- 
ing her  night  walks,  and  it  is  satisfactory  to  state  that 
the  recurrent  flash  of  historic  old  Guia  at  Macao  (the 
first  lighthouse  in  China)  was  followed  by  Robert  Hart’s 
provision  of  some  sixty  lights  along  the  coast,  which  has 
made  the  rapidly  increasing  navigation  wonderfully  safer. 
The  Imperial  Customs  paid  for  this  improvement,  making 
the  sea-going  nations,  as  well  as  the  Chinese,  double 
debtors  to  this  the  most  thorough  foreigner  who  has  ever 
given  his  life  service  to  China,  a veritable  Daniel  working 
for  the  people  of  Darius. 

When  you  pass  the  pickets  of  your  native  friend’s  com- 
pound, it  is  a sign  of  superior  breeding  to  cough  purposely 


126 


THE  CHINESE 


(we  may  even  say,  conspicuously  to  expectorate),  so  that 
none  of  the  opposite  sex  may  linger  longer  than  the  time 
necessary  to  discover  that  the  visitor  is  a man.  When 
the  women  have  escaped  you  shout  “ Li,”  which  is  an 
order  for  the  house  coolie  to  come  and  receive  your  long 
red  card.  It  would  express  the  lowest  breeding  to  ask 
your  host:  “ How  is  your  wife?  ” Wife  and  daughters 

must  remain  unmentioned;  their  privacy  is  like  their 
honor,  inviolate;  they  live  only  in  the  husband’s  and 
father’s  eye.  Mixed  social  gatherings  never  occur. 
There  are  no  women  on  the  Chinese  stage.  Among  the 
better  class,  the  boys  and  girls  of  the  family  are  entirely 
separated  after  the  age  of  six.  There  is  nothing  among 
their  middle  class  of  that  curse  of  American  and  Euro- 
pean cities,  “ a street  education  ” after  school  hours. 
Whatever  may  be  the  result  of  the  Chinese  system  in 
individual  development;  however  narrow  the  wife’s  social 
sphere  may  be  by  reigning  alone  in  a feminine  world,  the 
intent  is  sincere,  and  based  upon  the  lofty  desire  not  to 
soil  women  even  so  much  as  with  the  opportunity  for 
temptation.  No  modern  novel  has  been  written  in  China, 
because  no  fingers  have  been  scorched,  and  in  their 
measures  for  prevention  and  severity  upon  offenders,  the 
Confucians  say  they  only  agree  with  the  compilers  of  the 
Pentateuch.  As  soon  as  a child  rises  in  the  morning, 
the  first  duty  is  to  repair  to  the  parent’s  room,  and  inquire 
as  to  his  or  her  health.  And  so  through  life,  the  filial 
service  and  ceremonial  broaden,  to  be  looked  forward 
to  by  the  son  as  likewise  his  privilege  through  the  long 
golden  evening  of  age.  The  saddest  story  in  our  Scrip- 
tures to  the  Chinese  is  the  tale  of  Jacob  shorn  of  his  sons, 
looking  Egyptward.  Relationship  is  called  a “joint”; 
i,  e.,  second  cousin  is  “ second  joint.” 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


127 


.Womanhood  for  the  first  time  has  been  addressed 
in  an  official  document.  Viceroy  Chang  Chi  Tung 
of  Wuchang  has  compiled  an  elaborate  legal  book 
(meddling  missionary  propaganda,  take  note!)  of 
the  cases  from  earliest  times  between  the  Chinese, 
missionaries  and  converts.  The  book  is  inscril^ed 
to  “ The  fathers  and  mothers  of  the  people.” 
The  great  port  Yochovv,  at  the  confluence  of  the 
Yangtze  and  China’s  greatest  lake,  translated  means 
“ Mother  in  Law.”  The  culture  of  women  is  re- 
peatedly praised  in  the  histories,  novels  and  works  of 
philosophy.  A mother  is  expected  to  teach  her  boy  until 
he  can  go  to  school,  and  most  of  the  education  of  the 
daughters  devolves  upon  the  mothers.  Mixed  schools  are 
abhorred,  and  girls  are  not  permitted  to  leave  their 
mother’s  sight.  Chapels  of  missionaries  have  a curtain 
down  the  middle  of  the  room,  so  that  neither  sex  may 
intrude  upon  the  other  but  may  at  the  same  time  hear 
the  speaker  and  join  in  the  singing  and  responses.  The 
native  text  books  for  girls  set  forth  that  the  culture  of 
Mencius,  their  second  greatest  writer,  was  due  to  his 
mother’s  teaching,  and  one  of  China’s  lesser  classics, 
dating  back  to  B.  C.  120,  is  the  Lieh  Nu  Chuen  (History 
of  Cultured  Women).  Chinese  literature  has  its  Jeanne 
d’Arc  heroine  in  the  warlike  virgin  Wha-Mou-Loh.  In 
some  homes,  paintings  of  the  Mother  of  Buddha  are  to 
be  seen.  Prince  Ching  of  the  Imperial  Household,  and 
Governor  Chow  of  Mukden,  in  their  support  of  the  new 
educational  system,  advocate  its  extension  by  sending  girls 
abroad,  or  at  least  to  introduce  foreign  college  bred  gov- 
ernesses. 

Throughout  the  empire,  the  pai-lau  (memorial 
^rches)  are  the  most  conspicuous  architecture  next  to 


128 


THE  CHINESE 


the  pagodas.  Many  of  these  are  erected  in  honor  of 
chaste  or  learned  women,  and  widows  who  would  not 
marry  a second  time,  or,  as  their  epigrammatists  say: 
“ The  lady  who  the  second  time  married  the  white 
flower  in  her  hair,”  referring  to  the  fashion  of  widows. 
As  these  pai-lau  monuments  take  an  important  place  in 
the  education  of  the  people,  the  choosing  of  the  inscription 
is  reserved  for  the  throne,  through  the  Censor  Pu 
(Board).  An  important  class  in  the  community  are  the 
mei-jin  (between  people),  who  arrange  marriages.  The 
mother  of  the  family  has  a hundred  and  one  conferences 
with  them,  and  on  them,  in  her  seclusion,  she  relies  for 
the  dainty  bits  of  gossip  of  the  town,  all  the  more  colored 
by  an  imagination  removed,  because  one  could  not  go  and 
prove  the  facts.  An  important  present  from  the  youth 
to  his  betrothed  is  a ham,  of  which  she  sends  back  the 
foot  for  good  luck,  the  idea  being  the  same  as  our  darky’s 
esteem  for  a rabbit’s  foot.  When  the  samschu  cups  of 
bride  and  groom  are  raised,  you  will  notice  they  are  joined 
by  a thread,  which  should  on  no  account  be  broken.  It 
often  is,  however,  for  there  is  rough  teasing,  lao-sliing- 
fang  (bride-baiting)  of  the  bride  of  fourteen  years. 
February  with  them  takes  the  place  of  our  June  as  the 
popular  hymeneal  month.  Only  the  office  of  hicn-pi 
(first  wife)  is  recognized  by  the  ancestral  religion,  and 
the  children  of  the  tsieh  (concubine)  are  enrolled  on  the 
family  tablets  as  though  they  were  the  issue  of  the  hicn- 
pi.  This  differs  not  essentially  from  the  ways  of  patri- 
archal Israel. 

The  Chinese  insist  in  their  critical  moods  that  there 
are  fewer  concubinage  marriages  in  China,  under  the 
law,  than  there  are  clandestine  double  households  with- 
out the  law’s  pale,  in  the  life  of  the  Occidental.  High 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


129 


building’s,  and  the  Tangerian  custom  of  mounting 
to  one’s  roof,  are  abhorred  by  the  Chinese  as  the  grossest 
kinds  of  intrusion.  One’s  wall  can  on  no  good  account 
be  looked  over;  it  is  the  protection  of  women  from  the 
unchaste  and  forward,  and  is  therefore  thick  and  high, 
and  often  stronger  than  the  house  itself.  The  women 
of  China  have  a more  cumbersome  menage  to  run  than 
our  women  have,  which  speaks  for  their  patience,  industry 
and  cleverness.  They  have  no  ready-made,  automatic 
providers,  such  as  laundries,  abattoirs,  schools,  depart- 
ment stores,  telephones,  daily  mail  service,  etc.,  to  assist 
them  in  attending  to  the  wants  of  the  men  and  children, 
and  yet,  at  the  temples,  on  the  street,  or  upon  evenings 
in  the  garden,  it  can  not  be  said  that  their  families  bear 
the  evidence  of  household  neglect.  It  must  not  be  con- 
sidered that  the  Chinese  do  not  think  themselves  good- 
looking.  You  can  frequently  hear  their  women,  when 
they  are  commenting  on  a foreigner,  whose  face  conforms 
somewhat  to  their  standards,  remark : “ Why,  she  is 

nearly  as  good  looking  as  we  are.” 

In  every  hong  (office) ; in  every  rice  and  fish  shop;  in 
the  stern  of  every  sampan,  the  brewed  tea  is  left  handy, 
and  the  porcelain  from  which  you  drink  it  always  has  a 
painting  of  Mon  San  Gun,  the  god  of  longevity,  so  that 
you  may  drink  to  your  own  “ long  life.”  The  Chinese 
of  the  south  pronounce  it  “ chah,”  and  say : “ It  is  as 
sweet  as  a sparrow’s  tongue.”  In  the  theater,  and  fan- 
tan  gambling-house,  it  is  brought  to  you  as  a gift  from 
the  management.  I suppose  the  Chinese  average  a gallon 
a day.  They  seem  utterly  indifferent  to  its  toxic  qual- 
ities. In  India  and  Ceylon,  tea  is  manufactured  entirely 
by  machinery,  but  in  China  the  opposite  is  the  case.  In 
some  parts,  where  they  have  learned  the  habit  from  the 


130 


THE  CHINESE 


Russians,  Mongolians  grind  their  tea,  as  we  do  coffee, 
and  make  an  infusion  of  the  powder.  The  indulgence 
has  one  good  property,  in  that  the  malarial  waters  of  the 
land  are  not  used  unboiled.  The  wells  of  all  the  walled 
cities  are  revolting.  In  the  country,  however,  the  drawers 
do  not  soil  the  spring,  but  lead  the  stream  along  cut  bam- 
boo troughs  to  a roadside,  where  it  trickles  without  un- 
usual contamination  into  the  buckets.  The  bush,  being 
of  the  camellia  family,  likes  a loose,  hilly  soil,  such  as 
the  ranges  of  Nganwei,  where  the  green  tea  comes  from ; 
damp  heat;  showers;  fog  and  sun  bursting  through  with 
tropical  intensity,  all  of  which  south  China  is  ready  to 
furnish  to  the  letter.  Nature  being  more  anxious  to  pro- 
duce tea  than  men.  The  leaf  of  a full-grown  tea-bush 
is  larger  than  Westerners  would  think,  viz. : two  and  one- 
half  inches  long.  The  flower  is  white,  with  petals  set  like 
a cherry’s,  but  the  bloom  is  not  thickly  sown  in  the  bush. 

The  translations  of  the  familiar  brands  are  interest- 
ing: oolong  meaning  black  snake;  souchong,  small  leaf, 
being  picked  before  the  February  rains;  pccoe,  white 
fur,  from  the  fuzz  on  the  leaf  of  the  season’s  first  crop 
of  the  three-year-old  plant,  and  congou,  well  rolled. 
The  plants  from  the  famous  Dragon’s  Pool  Garden  have 
been  successfully  transplanted  to  South  Carolina.  The 
second  picking  takes  place  after  the  first  light  rains  of 
June.  After  the  last  crop,  the  clippings  of  the  stems 
and  branches  are  saved  and  sent  to  the  poor  of  Japan, 
who  use  it  for  a tea  called  bancha.  Each  crop  affords 
about  four  hundred  pounds  of  dried  tea  per  acre.  The 
curing  of  black  tea  is  tedious,  every  leaf  being  opened 
by  hand  four  times  after  each  passing  over  the  charcoal 
fire,  three  times  in  a latticed  basket,  and  once  in  a metal 
pan.  It  is  calletl  Ki  (flag),  wlien  it  easily  unrolls,  and 


Country  scene  400  miles  inland,  tea  district,  Kiang-si  province.  Tea 
bushes  on  foothills:  rice  (paddy)  fields  in  meadow.  The 
modern  houses  are  erected  by  Russians  to  store  tea 


An  irrigated  valley  of  rich  Hunan  province,  Central  China.  600  miles 
from  the  coast,  where  natives  are  patriotic  for  a modern 
China  and  are  most  unfriendly  to  foreigners.  Hiinan  is 
ruled  rigorously  hy  \ iceroy  Chang  Chih  Tung. 


coast,  outside  I ieiitsin. 


h'lat.  rice-growing  conntry 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


131 

Tsiang  (awl),  when  through  perfected  fermentation,  it 
keeps  its  dry,  tight  curl.  Expert  knowledge  is  required 
to  know  how  much  fire  the  leaf  will  bear,  the  object  being 
to  get  the  last  particle  of  moisture  out,  and  as  this  is  un- 
dertaken in  a moist  climate,  the  tea  workers  have  an  ar- 
duous task.  The  leaf  ferments  between  the  first  and 
second  firings,  with  the  result  that  some  of  the  injurious 
tannic  acid  is  turned  to  sugar.  This  rehandling  and 
fermentation  is  not  done  with  green  tea,  the  leaf  of  which 
is  allowed  to  dry  after  one  firing.  In  the  final  drying  a 
room  called  the  “ human  oven  ” is  heated,  into  which  the 
workers  rush  with  covered  mouths  for  a minute  each  time 
to  rescue  the  laden  bamboo  baskets. 

The  success  of  the  Chinese  tea  is  well  known.  Only 
their  leaf  keeps  strength  for  long  periods.  Moreover,  the 
Chinese  tea  has  the  largest  percentage  of  theine  (the  ex- 
hilaration and  perspiration  principle),  with  the  least  pro- 
portion of  the  poisonous  tannin,  the  toxic  principle,  so 
abundant  in  Ceylon  tea.  The  Assam  leaf  is  larger  and 
coarser  than  that  of  China  proper,  and  is  only  fit  for  black 
tea  of  an  inferior  grade.  The  blackness  of  some  brands 
of  tea  is  brought  about  by  arrested  fermentation.  The 
Chinese  themselves  secure  a stronger  effect  from  their  tea, 
as  there  is  no  necessity  for  them  to  brew  the  highly  dried 
varieties.  They  use  the  greener  uncurled  leaf,  just  as  we 
might  take  six  leaves  of  an  ash  tree,  and  put  them  in  a 
small  cup.  These  bunches  of  uncurled  leaves  are  tied  into 
pretty  packages  with  silk.  The  infused  leaf  is  also  eaten 
as  a salad.  The  different  aromas  of  tea  are  produced  by 
azalea,  orange,  jasmine,  or  tuberose  petals,  according  to 
whichever  bloom  fnay  be  out  at  the  time  of  the  tea-pick- 
ing. Last  spring  the  price  of  tea  materially  increased  on 
account  of  the  scarcity  of  the  jasmine  flower.  An 


132 


THE  CHINESE 


astringent  tea  of  delicate  odor  is  prepared  from  the  tea 
flowers.  The  oppressed  tea  growers  of  China  are 
assessed  an  export  (loti)  tax  as  high  as  twenty-five  per 
cent,  of  the  value  of  the  tea,  and  this  five  years  ago  nearly 
throttled  the  trade. 

Though  Russians  have  the  name  of  being  the  largest 
tea  patrons  of  China,  Australians  really  lead  with  a con- 
sumption of  eleven  pounds  a year  per  head,  against  two 
pounds  in  America,  while  the  vinous  French  are  at  the 
foot  of  the  procession  with  three-tenths  of  a pound. 
China  sells  Russia  sixteen  million  pounds  of  black  tea 
each  year.  A vast  deal  of  it  is  ground  and  pressed  into 
bricks  at  Tokmakoff’s  Russian  factory  at  Han-kau,  where 
you  will  find  a dominating  colony  of  Russians.  The 
bricks  are  an  inch  thick,  and  nine  by  twelve  inches 
across.  Some  Americans  who  have  lived  in  China  long 
enough  to  become  tea-soaked  find  on  returning  home 
to  their  trying  climate  that  they  can  not  touch  the 
cup  at  all,  especially  if  it  is  the  tannic  green  tea,  a 
few  cups  a day  soon  producing  tea-poisoning  with  most 
distressing  feelings.  Indeed,  those  who  are  thus  sensitive 
are  compelled  to  give  up  every  excitant  for  years,  whether 
alcoholic,  drug  or  tannic.  The  strongest  tea  known  to 
the  Chinese  is  grown  at  Pu  Erh  in  Yunnan,  and  is  war- 
ranted to  curl  a novice  up  as  though  he  were  the  fired  leaf 
itself.  Perhaps  the  strangest  of  all  the  tea  preparations 
is  the  Thibetan’s.  The  infusion  of  tea  is  poured  into  a 
wooden  bowl.  Goat’s  butter  and  barley  flour  are  added, 
and  all  are  beaten  into  a dough  called  “ Jamba,”  which  is 
eaten  warm.  This,  with  uncooked  powdered  mutton 
(even  lumber  powders  in  high,  dry  Thibet)  are  the  main- 
stays of  the  daily  meal.  That  China  teas  are  coming  into 
their  own  again  was  evidenced  last  June  at  the  opening 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


133 


of  the  Canton  market,  when  the  highest  bids  of  ten  years 
were  recorded.  Emphatically,  the  difference  between 
theine  and  tannin  is  important,  and  no  physician,  who 
works  upon  the  Chinese  plan  of  being  paid  for  keeping 
his  patients  well,  should  fail  to  enroll  himself  on  the  side 
of  Chinese  teas  against  the  world. 

I picture  a tea  scene,  which  may  be  upon  your  porcelain 
saucer,  but  in  reality  is  among  the  famous  Sunglo  Hills 
of  Nganwei  Province,  where  the  able  late  Empress  Dow- 
ager was  born,  though  she  was  of  Manchu  blood.  The 
slopes  and  peaks  rise  everywhere.  Here  and  there  you 
can  discover  the  huts  of  the  pickers,  nestled  below  the 
cultivated  terraces.  It  is  just  dawn  when  the  women 
(the  older  ones  with  untidy  hair)  come  forth  with  their 
crates  to  essay  their  long  tasks.  The  girls  wear  yellow 
pomegranate  flowers  in  their  hair,  and  are  as  merry  as 
the  birds  which  dart  among  the  bamboos  which  have  been 
set  for  wind-breaks.  There  is  little  light  or  view,  for  the 
mist  still  delays  to  rise  and  roll.  The  workers  call  out 
to  one  another  in  falsetto  tones,  as  they  cross  paths,  and 
inquire  which  hill  they  have  chosen  for  the  day.  They 
separate  into  couples,  who  take  turns  in  holding 
down  the  top  branches  for  the  other  to  pick  the  leaves. 
The  tops  are  picked  first ; it  makes  selected  drying.  The 
gatherers  are  working  with  speed,  hot  as  it  is,  for  the 
rains  threaten.  Jokes  are  passed : “ I’ve  picked  enough 

to  make  a Hung  Mao’s  (Englishman’s)  head  go  round 
like  a bamboo  water-wheel.”  When  the  baskets  are 
heaped,  so  that  the  cover  is  put  down  with  difficulty  (it 
is  too  windy  on  these  uplands  to  rely  on  a stone  for 
weight)  the  pickers  do  not  wait  for  the  collectors,  but 
wend  their  \vay  back  to  a receiving  hut  set  beside  a lotus 
pool,  where  willows  grow.  Do  not  be  irreverent.  Hung 


134 


THE  CHINESE 


Mao,  and  say  the  willows  are  there  to  supply  adulteration ! 
Banter  is  the  diversion  of  those  who  are  resting.  As 
through  all  the  world,  when  women  become  manual 
workers,  their  talk  verges  on  masculine  humor.  The 
branches  and  stony  hills  have  torn  their  feet,  clothes  and 
hair,  and  the  wind,  too,  has  added  his  derision.  The 
poor  mortals  look  miserable  enough.  Until  sundown 
they  work  on  the  hill,  staying  longest  at  the  southern 
portion,  for  there  the  leaves  are  thickest.  Until  midnight 
they  labor  in  the  firing  rooms,  which  are  lit  with  smoky 
nut-oil  lamps.  Before  the  jasmine  bud  has  spilt  its  ma- 
tutinal libation  of  attar  beneath  the  window  of  their  sleep- 
ing rooms,  the  bronzed  toilers  have  arisen,  and  gone  forth 
again  with  laughter  unto  the  hill  which  never  sleeps,  be- 
cause it  must  work  for  a foreign  world  which  never  ceases 
to  thirst. 

The  most  gruesome  feature  of  the  fatalistic  Chinese 
and  Japanese  character, — the  quality  which  makes  them 
terrible  as  well-led  soldiers, — is  their  stolid  view  of  death. 
The  Japanese  hara-kiri,  imposed  for  political  or  battlefield 
failures,  has  done  more  to  ostracize  the  Japanese  from 
occidental  sympathy  than  our  jealousy  of  their  success, 
or  irritation  at  their  trickiness.  In  China  a coolie  any- 
where can  be  bought  for  two  hundred  dollars,  paid  to  his 
family,  to  jump  from  behind  a mound,  and  take  the  place 
of  the  quail  or  pheasant,  when  the  authorities  wish  to 
cause  a scandal,  and  stop  shooting  by  foreigners  in  the 
grave  districts.  When  China’s  first  railroad  of  twelve 
miles  from  Woosung  to  Shanghai  was  built  in  1876,  we 
all  remember  that  a native,  whose  business  of  tugging 
boats  along  the  river  was  threatened  by  the  new  enter- 
prise, deliberately  walked  in  front  of  the  train.  His 
death,  of  course,  accomplished  the  purpose  of  the  manda- 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


135 


rins  in  starting  an  effective  boycott  against  the  innova- 
tion. The  repetitions  of  this  sacrifice  on  the  national 
altar  (as  they  see  it)  on  the  Yuet-IIan,  Peking-IIan-kau, 
and  other  railways,  have  been  frequent.  The  Chinese 
method  of  suicide  among  unhappily  betrothed  gitls  is  to 
take  an  over-dose  of  opium;  among  men,  the  larynx  is 
opened,  or  the  victim  hangs  himself,  which  last  is  the 
method  official  Peking  favors  for  the  political  non 
grafas. 

Tientsin  and  Mongolian  larks  are  matched  to  sing  at 
daybreak.  To  the  open  field,  even  to  the  lawn  under  the 
English  Club’s  windows  at  Hong-Kong,  the  cages  are 
brought,  and  set  out  on  the  grass  by  the  native  silk  mer- 
chants, who  are  not  too  dignified  to  run  after  grasshoppers 
to  reward  their  pets.  Over  the  dewy  lawn  the  owners 
saunter  and  enjoy  the  only  refreshing  coolness  of  the 
tropical  day.  As  the  sun  bursts  out  in  his  glory,  the 
birds  are  set  free  and  matched  in  song.  The  gentry  take 
infinite  delight  in  the  conquests  of  their  prized  singers. 
Some  cost  as  high  as  twenty-five  dollars  each,  which  is 
a fortune  in  China.  Who  can  gainsay  that  something 
patient  and  good  lies  in  the  hearts  of  a people,  who  can 
find  that  such  pastimes,  even  to  full  manhood,  afford 
untiring  pleasures? 

The  youths  of  thirteen  to  seventeen,  gathered  on  the 
Praya  in  groups  of  six  or  more  on  a side,  dexterously  use 
their  feet  in  back  and  side  kicks  as  a battledore,  to  keep 
a shuttlecock  in  the  air  for  minutes  at  a time.  No  boxing 
ring  ever  trained  so  well  for  shiftiness.  The  boys  excel 
in  kite-flying.  In  the  ports  like  Hong-Kong,  where  there 
are  overhead  wires  of  a modern  civilization,  there  is  a 
ludicrous  hanging  out  of  all  kinds  of  derelict  air-ships 
and  their  tangled  cables.  Dragons,  hawks,  larks  and  fish 


136 


THE  CHINESE 


are  all  represented  in  the  shapes.  Faces  of  the  gods  are 
painted  on  round  and  oblong  disks.  On  the  strings  are 
hooks,  blades,  and  pasted  ground  glass.  Great  skill  is 
shown  in  the  mid-air  battles,  as  the  kites  are  mancEuvered 
into  conflict.  A hook  tears  out  the  body  of  a dragon,  and 
the  wreckage  comes  to  earth  to  the  great  delight  of  the 
assailant.  Or  a string  is  broken,  and  a god  goes  soaring 
cloudward.  It  is  considered  an  ill  omen  to  allow  the 
possession  of  the  heavenly  being  to  evanesce  into  the 
ethereal  again.  A Chinese  nurse  teaches  her  charge  that 
it  is  auspicious  to  dream  of  a mountain,  an  eagle,  an  egg- 
plant, a funeral,  a snake,  a horse ; or  to  meet  a priest  the 
first  thing  upon  the  road.  It  is  lucky  to  be  erroneously 
reported  dead,  and  a mirror  hung  over  the  door  keeps 
away  bad  fortune.  It  is  obviously  ominous  to  trip  in  a 
cemetery.  When  Chinese  children  wish  to  express  de- 
rision, they  do  not  make  faces,  but  catch  up  the  corners  of 
their  tunics  and  shake  them. 

The  Chinese,  with  his  paint  brush,  takes  twice  our  time 
to  execute  his  letter,  but  with  his  swanpan  or  abacus,  he 
counts  twice  as  quickly  as  we  do,  so  that  clerical  honors 
are  even.  In  recording  time,  the  year  of  the  sovereign’s 
reign  is  generally  used,  though  there  is  a cycle  system 
among  the  Buddhists,  based  on  every  sixty  years  as  the 
length  of  a good  man’s  life,  in  which  modesty  of  allot- 
ment the  race  confesses  its  inferiority  in  medical  science, 
as  compared  even  with  the  times  of  the  Psalmist. 

About  two  hundred  thousand  people  live  in  boats  on 
the  river  at  Canton,  and  fifty  thousand  at  Hong- Kong. 
It  is  this  custom  which  makes  it  possible  for  such  losses 
of  life  to  occur  in  typhoons,  as  in  the  catastrophe  of  Sej>- 
tember,  1906,  at  Hong- Kong.  The  passenger  steamer 
arriving  at  Canton  fi*bm  Hong-Kong  has  an  exciting  pas- 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


137 


sage  through  the  narrow  lane  which  is  cleared  through 
the  sampan  fleet.  The  fleet  must  anchor  at  night  in 
regular  lanes,  each  boat  having  a stated  place.  Tens  of 
thousands  of  the  people  never  go  ashore.  Doctors, 
priests,  mendicants,  traders,  artisans,  gamblers,  and 
strumpets  (slwi  kce),  all  ply  their  trade  by  boat  through- 
out this  floating  village.  At  night  each  boat  is  compelled 
by  law  to  hoist  to  the  masthead  a light,  which  generally 
burns  nut-oil.  As  one  looks  from  the  city  walls,  the 
view  is  that  of  the  Milky  Way  turned  upside  down. 
The  panorama  at  night,  especially  during  the  Moon 
Feast,  from  Hong-Kong’s  signal  staff  on  Victoria  Peak, 
fifteen  hundred  feet  directly  above  the  Colony’s  sampan 
fleet,  is  even  finer.  The  boat  women  all  carry  their 
children  papoose  fashion,  and  as  the  repetition  is  fre- 
quent, the  girls  of  eight  must  carry  their  youngest 
brother  but  one,  to  aid  the  mother,  who  with  one  hand 
holds  an  infant,  and  with  the  other  guides  the  sampan’s 
tiller  or  handles  the  sail  halyards.  The  younger  children 
sprawling  about  the  decks,  have  dried  bottle-gourds 
strapped  to  their  shoulders  to  assist  in  supporting  them, 
should  they  fall  overboard.  A Chinese  goes  overboard 
feet  first,  and  not  head  first  in  his  dive. 

It  is  to  take  the  wings  of  Aeolus,  to  step  into  one  of 
these  passenger  boats  when  the  wind  is  on  the  quarter. 
The  boats  are  flat-bottomed,  eighteen  feet  long,  with  a 
narrow  racing  prow,  latticed  rudder,  single  square  sail,  no 
jib,  and  ballasted  heavily.  The  bamboo  battens,  stretched 
across  the  sail,  enable  the  crew  to  haul  their  sampan  some- 
what on  the  wind,  but  the  performance  at  best  is  a sorry 
one.  Such  a sail  of  course  reefs  itself  instantly,  and  upon 
this  quality  in  a storm,  the  crew  depends  more  than  on  the 
ballast.  When  the  wind  is  untoward,  the  woman  sculls. 


138 


THE  CHINESE 


and  her  husband  in  the  bow  has  to  exert  himself  with 
oars  long  enough  to  clear  the  wide  waist  of  the  boat. 
The  passenger  crouches  in  a bamboo  coop,  and  from  the 
second  hatch  in  front  of  him  peep  the  tenantry  of  chil- 
dren, chow  dogs  and  chickens,  while  as  company  for 
himself,  he  hears  the  metallic  scampering  of  the  cock- 
roaches along  the  three  seats  around  him.  On  the 
larger  junks,  when  the  wind  is  adverse,  the  long  spliced 
sweeps,  made  from  whole  fir  trees,  are  unshipped.  The 
rowers,  like  gondoliers,  push  them,  walking  forward  on 
a cleated  wale  which  projects  over  the  stern.  The  pas- 
sage of  the  lime  and  cement  boats  across  Hong-Kong’s 
harbor  is  a characteristic  sight,  ten  to  fifteen  sweep 
pushers  on  each  side  standing  out  yellow,  naked  and 
brawny  against  the  white-heaped  cargo.  The  sails  seen 
in  a treaty  port  are  a curiosity.  A Hakka  never  be- 
lieves in  mending  until  a thing  is  near  ending,  and  this 
applies  also  to  his  patient  politics.  The  sails  are  half 
holes,  quarter  matting,  and  the  remaining  quarter  a 
motley  of  American  cotton  flour  bags,  with  the  brands 
favored  by  the  local  trade  emblazoned : “ Duck  Lily,” 

“ Golden  Pheasant,”  “ Tiger  Lady,”  “ Twelve  Pigs,”  etc. 
While  speaking  of  brands  it  will  be  interesting  to  re- 
cite their  favorites  in  the  cotton  piece  trade : “ Rat,” 

“ Sitting  Tiger,”  “ Heaven  Girl,”  “ Eighteen  Sons,” 
“ Twelve  Geishas,”  “ Ox  Plows  in  Field,”  etc.  In 
Kwangtung  Province  the  fisher  folk  bring  to  the  shore 
in  October  an  offering  unto  the  sea  of  a pig  and  a sheep. 
These,  cooked,  are  set  upon  a table  in  the  sands,  and 
prostrations  are  made  by  mandarin  and  bonze  before  a 
paper  effigy  of  a ship.  The  junks  all  have  an  orlop  deck 
in  the  high  stern.  Caulking  is  done  with  rattan,  which 
is  cemented  down  with  oil  and  g)qDSum.  In  them,  you 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


139 


behold  the  famous  vessel  which  invented  water-tight 
compartments,  centuries  before  the  West  adopted  the 
idea. 

The  foreigner  of  the  treaty  port  is  agreeably  impressed 
by  the  cordiality  of  their  New  Year  holiday  time,  when 
on  every  hand  ring  the  words:  Kung  Hai  Fat  Tsoy,” 

(Congratulations;  may  you  collect  wealth).  The  com- 
mencement of  the  New  Year  week  may  vary  a month 
between  a period  of  years,  as  the  festival  begins  with 
the  first  new  moon  after  the  sun  has  entered  Aquarius. 
It  therefore  occurs  in  our  January  and  February,  and 
is  observed  by  at  least  a week  of  closed  shop.  It  is  the 
only  time  of  the  year  when  the  Chinese  really  close  their 
shops.  In  the  ports,  the  greetings  seldom  go  to  the 
extent  of  the  kowtow,  wdiere  the  knees  and  forehead 
touch  the  ground.  This  being  a busy  world,  and  be- 
coming so  even  in  China,  the  kung  shao,  or  joining 
the  fists  and  raising  them  before  the  heart,  while  the 
w'ord  ” tsing”  (hail)  is  repeated,  are  made  to  suffice. 
The  name  of  the  New  York  state  penitentiary,  Sing 
Sing,  therefore  means  “ Hail,  Hail ! ” literally,  or  idiom- 
atically “ Happy  New  Year,”  to  a Chinese.  Our  Mott 
and  Doyers  Street  brethren  of  the  Tong  societies  are 
vastly  amused,  when  they  learn  that  their  crimes  are  to 
take  them  to  such  a felicitous  gateway.  Of  lesser  sig- 
nificance are  the  Feast  of  Lanterns  in  February;  the 
Dragon  Festival  and  Regatta  in  July;  the  Moon  Fes- 
tival in  September,  and  the  Winter  Solstice  in  Novem- 
ber. These  feasts  are  the  periods  for  financial  settle- 
ments. 

Fighting  of  crickets  is  a favorite  gambling  game. 
The  little  combatants  are  placed  in  straw  cages,  and 
carried  to  the  circular  miniature  ring.  One  is  distin- 


140 


THE  CHINESE 


gtiished  from  the  other  by  a painted  white  band  across 
the  wings.  Scorpions  and  lizards  are  also  matched,  and 
bets  are  made  whether  the  former  will  commit  suicide  by 
stinging  himself  to  death  when  he  continually  misses  the 
more  alert  lizard.  Fires  are  built  by  the  more  brutal  of 
the  jeunesse  on  the  backs  of  tortoises,  to  incite  them  to 
race,  and  cockroaches  are  made  drunk  so  that  bets  may 
be  made  which  side  of  the  ring  the  foolish  insect  will  roll 
over.  Where  there  is  a river  praya,  or  court  large 
enough,  the  booth  gamblers  suddenly  set  up  shop  from 
within  their  umbrellas,  and  a crowd  immediately  gathers, 
just  as  a stone  thrown  in  a stream  collects  foam  in- 
stantly. Often  betting  is  going  on  around  a fruit 
wagon,  to  count  the  seeds  of  a coolie-orange.  The  skin 
is  not  given  to  you  when  you  purchase  the  fruit ; 
it  is  sold  to  the  skin-candiers  and  the  makers  of  fever- 
tea.  Until  the  government  stopped  the  immigration, 
Canton  used  to  send  to  FIong-Kong  ship-loads  of 
its  prisoners  and  gamblers.  The  bare-shouldered 
coolie,  on  his  way  from  hoisting  or  sawing  great  teak 
logs,  or  carrying  coal  in  baskets,  loves  nothing  better, 
as  a diversion,  than  to  gather  around  a street  fakir’s 
basket  or  a gambler’s  booth.  He  howls  in  glee  when 
the  dissatisfied  crowd  turns  the  booth  over,  and  the 
lukongs,  with  their  glistening  enameled  helmets  bear- 
ing the  feathers  of  British  law,  swoop  with  padded 
feet  silently  upon  the  melee ; or  the  red-turbanned 
Sikhs  hear  too  great  a commotion  in  a coolie  boarding- 
house on  Elgin  or  Mosque  Streets,  and  rush  in  to  catch 
the  rascals  red-handed  at  a game  of  pai-kau,  or  “ Sap  Ing 
Wui.”  The  runaways,  with  their  padded  shoes,  think 
nothing  of  jumping  thirty-five  feet  to  the  ground. 
There  are  many  deaths  however  from  contusion  of  the 


INCIDENTS  OF 'DAILY  LIFE 


141 

brain,  because  the  Celestial  Icarus  is  unable  to  keep  his 
feet  when  he  lands  on  them. 

King  of  all  their  games,  especially  at  that  oriental 
Monte  Carlo,  Macao,  is  fan-tan,  where  a large  handful 
of  bright  “ cash  ” is  taken  from  a heap  at  one  end  of  the 
table,  and  covered  with  a cup.  This  table  is  at  the  bottom 
of  a well.  A two-story  gallery  rises  above  the  table,  and 
the  bets  of  those  looking  down  are  swung  in  a tiny  bas- 
ket to  the  cashier.  Gamblers  also  sit  around  the  table, 
and  closely  watch  the  drawer.  When  the  bets  are  all 
placed  on  numbers  one,  two,  three  or  four,  or  divided  on 
two  numbers,  the  drawing  begins  by  picking  from  the  pile 
under  the  cup,  four  cash  at  a time.  What  remains  at  the 
last  draw,  wins.  The  Chinese  seem  able  to  tell,  when 
there  are  ten  to  thirteen  cash  undrawn,  what  number  will 
remain,  and  you  hear  the  shouts  of  the  winners  becoming 
clamorous:  “Hi  Yah,  three  wins,  three  wins.”  The 

croupier  takes  out  ten  per  cent,  for  the  bank.  The 
winners  never  gain  higher  than  eight  to  one.  The  bank 
is  never  broken.  Free  cigars  and  tea  are  passed  around 
by  attendants.  The  lanterns  outside  of  the  gambling 
dens  of  Macao  are  the  gaudiest  the  world  over.  One 
may  feel  safe  while  in  the  vicinity  of  their  light  and  the 
lukong’s  whistle,  but  the  way  back  to  the  hotel  is  a 
threatening  and  dark  one  through  streets  as  crooked  as 
an  earthquake’s  edge.  Chai  Mui,  is  the  betting  game 
of  feasts,  when  the  open  fingers  of  the  hand  are  thrust 
against  an  opponent’s  in  a gamble  on  the  total.  The 
loser  must  empty  a cup  of  hot  samschu  rice  wine,  their 
humor  lying  in  the  effort  to  get  every  one  drunk  but 
themselves.  The  roulette-like  game  of  Po  Tsz  is  pop- 
ular among  the  Hakka  tribes  at  Kowloon.  Betting  in 
the  temples  on  the  Vi-seng,  or  examination  lottery,  has 


142 


THE  CHINESE 


been  prohibited  by  the  government,  that  the  dignity  both 
of  religion  and  literature  may  be  maintained.  China  is 
so  vast  a body,  in  territory,  in  numbers  and  in  history, 
that  it  is  hard  to  believe  it  is  moving  until  surveys  like 
this  are  set  upon  various  fixed  marks  in  its  social  habits. 
As  Japan  is  running  a Formosan  lottery,  and  Portuguese 
Macao,  the  famous  religious  one  of  the  Casa  Miseri- 
cordia,  so  China  has  lately  licensed  drawings  at  Han- 
kau,  where  the  Russian  tea  colony  is  a large  patron  of 
it. 

Number  three  and  its  multiples  are  recognized  as  the 
numerals  of  honor  and  good  luck.  The  Emperor’s 
sacred  mythical  dragon,  on  which  he  rides  in  life  and 
death,  has  nine  times  nine  scales.  At  the  funeral  of  an 
official,  “ nine  times  nine  virtuous  Buddhist  priests  ” 
offer  up  prayers  for  his  absolution  from  punishment,  and 
for  his  purification.  The  great  marble  altar  at  Peking 
for  the  worship  of  Shangtai,  (Lord  of  Heaven,  and 
answering  to  our  word  God)  is  of  three  terraces, 
each  three  times  the  size  of  the  one  above  it.  The  top 
terrace  is  three  times  thirty  feet  across,  the  slabs  being 
laid  concentrically  in  multiples  of  nine,  and  the  steps  are 
nine  in  each  of  the  three  series.  Beside  the  white 
marble  altar  rise  three  red  poles  which  suspend  the  lan- 
terns when  the  Emperor  makes  that  most  solemn  wor- 
ship, from  a picturesque  point  of  view,  of  all  the  earth’s 
kings,  just  before  dawn,  uncanopied  save  by  the  stars, 
and  mysteriously  unwatched  by  the  wide  sleeping  world. 
There  are  “Three  Manies”;  many  years;  many  joys; 
many  sons,  which  it  is  enjoined  may  be  engraved  on 
jade  charms.  Kowtows  are  done  by  threes.  Pagodas 
are  of  six  or  nine  stories.  The  entrances  of  yamens  and 
temples  are  triple.  Poets  in  adorning  their  rhyme,  speak 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


143 


of  the  “ pagoda’s  lamps  illumining  the  thirty-three 
heavens.”  The  shares  of  the  Yuet-Han  (Canton  to 
Han-kau)  Railway  are  for  three  dollars.  The  Guild 
of  the  Nine  Hospitals  of  Canton  is  famous  for  its 
charities  and  leadership  in  finance.  Then  in  contradic- 
tion, birthdays  are  celebrated  on  the  odd  number  period ; 
i.  e.,  the  thirty-first,  the  forty-first,  etc. 

The  Chinese  are  very  fond  of  using  numbers  as  we  use 
rhymes,  to  remember  related  facts  and  names,  as  the  ” five 
virtues  ” ; the  “ ten  moral  duties  of  men  ” ; the  “ ten  trea- 
sonable offenses”  of  the  Ta  Tsing  Link  Li  (Book  of 
Laws);  the  “five  metals”;  the  “five  essences”;  the 
“ three  powers  ” ; the  “ five  colors  ” ; the  “ eight  immor- 
tals ” of  the  Taoists;  the  “ three  bonds,  of  law,  filial  duty, 
and  marriage  ” ; etc.,  etc.  Although  they  employ  allitera- 
tion and  rhyme,  they  prefer  to  express  emphasis  by 
numbers.  It  is  very  common  to  observe  even  the  most 
stupid  looking  coolie,  who  has  been  reviewing  boycott 
caricatures,  wake  up,  and  warmly  say  to  a clansman 
who  proposes  going  to  the  treaty  port  to  ship  as  an 
emigrant : “ Ten  thousand  times  I say  it,  don’t  go,  they 
will  sell  you  like  a pig.”  The  Chinese  day  is  divided 
into  twelve  shins  (two  hours).  These  parts  are  not 
known  by  numbers,  but  by  poetic  names.  Their  lineal 
measure  is  the  chih,  equaling  fourteen  of  our  inches. 
Their  liquid  measure,  the  tao,  contains  one  and  one- 
tenth  gallons,  while  the  sheng  contains  nearly  an  English 
quart.  Distance  is  computed  by  the  level  lee,  which  is 
one-third  of  a mile  on  the  flat.  One-sixth  of  a mile 
up-hill  is  talked  of  as  a lee,  to  express  the  ostensible 
difficulty  of  the  road.  One  cheiing  is  fifteen  feet. 
Land  is  measured  by  the  onao,  or  one-fifth  of  an 
acre  at  Canton,  and  one-sixth  at  Peking.  Their  sys- 


144 


THE  CHINESE 


tern  of  weights  is  more  familiar  to  the  foreigner  who  is 
compelled  to  use  them  at  the  treaty  ports;  viz.,  tael,  one 
and  one-third  ounces  troy;  catty,  one  and  one-third 
pounds  avoirdupois;  picul,  one  hundred  thirty-three  and 
one-third  pounds,  and  tan,  two  hundred  forty  pounds. 
If  your  ship  breaks  the  native  merchant’s  flour  bag  or 
box  of  abalone,  he  will  bring  to  your  perplexed,  last  im- 
ported “ griffln  ” clerk,  the  claim  papers  figured  in  cat- 
ties,  and  leave  him  to  reconcile  the  pounds  of  his  mani- 
fest 

All.  the  cattle  used  in  Hong-Kong  and  Manila  come 
from  a little  river  port  named  Do-Shing,  far  above 
Canton  on  the  Sikiang  River.  The  animal  is  small, 
with  buffalo  characteristics  as  to  hump,  and  is  a near 
relative  of  the  wild  anao  of  Celebes  Island.  The  horns 
are  wide.  The  sight  of  lifting  these  animals  from  the 
junks  by  the  ship’s  hoist,  attached  to  a gunny  band  about 
their  bellies,  is  a characteristic  view  of  Hong-Kong’s 
unique  harbor  life,  as  strenuous  as  the  West,  although 
under  an  X-ray  tropical  sun. 

The  water-buffaloes  {shui-niii)  of  the  rice  tillers  are 
used  to  pull  a wooden  plow  through  the  flooded 
fields,  to  turn  the  loam  around  the  roots  of  the  trans- 
planted rice.  A threshing  floor  is  rolled  out  on  the 
open  earth,  and  men,  animals  and  flails  are  used  to  beat 
out  the  grain.  When  the  animals  are  off  duty  they 
wade  out  into  the  sea  to  escape  the  gnats  which  torture 
their  hairless  hides.  The  drov^es  of  these  animals  which 
wade  into  the  bay  off  Kowloon  Point  is  another  of 
Hong-Kong’s  interesting  sights.  They  have  vast 
strength,  and  thick,  almost  circular  horns.  While  docile 
with  the  Chinese,  to  whom  they  are  used,  they  viciously 
and  suddenly  attack  foreigners  and  horses,  trusting  to 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


145 


one  fell  sweep  of  the  horns  to  disembowel  the  victims. 
The  buffaloes  are  sometimes  baited.  The  animal  will 
defend  his  muddy  lair.  The  challenging  beast  is  brought 
up,  when  the  defender  rushes  to  the  fray.  The  animals 
are  seldom  goaded,  and  the  fight  is  never  to  the  death, 
as  the  mild-blooded  Chinese  seem  satisfied  when  one 
animal  turns  tail. 

To  speak  generally,  man  is  the  beast  of  burden  in 
China,  although  there  is  this  notable  exception : at 
the  salt  wells  of  Szechuen  and  Shansi,  one  hundred 
thousand  water-buffaloes  are  used  to  work  the  primitive 
pumping  machinery.  In  Korea  one  sees  many  black 
bullocks.  Not  a Chinese  city,  except  Peking  and  Tai 
Yuan,  has  laid  its  streets  wide  enough  for  carts.  The 
founders  expected  that  men  always  would  be  the  carriers. 
A stout  bamboo  is  thrown  across  the  shoulder,  and  if 
a coolie  has  a pig  to  carry  home  at  one  end  of  it,  he 
balances  it  with  some  other  household  necessity,  or  at 
least  a pail  of  water  which  always  comes  in  useful, — not 
necessarily  on  the  person,  for  before  that  luxury  the  fer- 
tilizer pit  is  selected.  The  almost  naked  stevedores  of 
the  treaty  ports  are  magnificent  fellows,  the  proudest 
examples  of  a vegetarian  diet  the  world  over.  If  you 
doubt  their  power,  it  is  sufficient  to  watch  them  empty 
a junk  full  of  the  immense  India  gunny  bales.  No 
cranes  are  used.  From  the  bottom  of  the  hold,  planks 
are  laid,  and  up  these  from  tier  to  tier,  the  sure-footed, 
bronze-colored  coolies  carry  their  monstrous  loads,  which 
are  suspended  from  a bamboo  laid  upon  the  bare,  smok- 
ing shoulders  of  ten  men.  Literally  they  are  mighty 
men  of  metal,  for  one  seldom  hears  of  a sore  shoulder, 
or  complaints  about  the  burden.  The  chanty  song  is 
continually  in  use,  and  the  possessor  of  the  leading  voice 


146 


THE  CHINESE 


gets  more  pay  than  the  foreman.  The  Kowloon  coolies 
who  drag  teak  lumber  into  piles,  and  those  who  saw  it, 
are  even  more  famous  for  their  longer  falsetto  chanties, 
which  are  decidedly  the  most  musical  thing  to  our  ear, 
in  the  far  East. 

Where  one  would  say  the  “ roast  beef  of  old  Eng- 
land,” here  it  would  be  the  “ stewed  hog  of  old  China.” 
All  eyes  look  upon  him  with  a deep  intent,  even  though 
few  can  afford  a piece  of  him.  The  golden  bamboo  is 
woven  about  him,  and  he  is  laid,  one  on  another,  on  a 
two-wheeled  cart  which  protrudes  to  great  length  before 
and  behind  the  axle.  The  load  is  arranged  about  to 
balance  itself.  Ropes  are  attached  for  ten  coolies  to 
pull,  and  ropes  are  stretched  behind  so  that  four  coolies 
may  retard  when  the  course  is  on  one  of  the  many  de- 
clivities of  Hong-Kong.  There  are  few  steam  whistles 
even  in  the  treaty  ports,  but,  as  always.  Nature  rushes 
to  fill  the  vacuum  which  she  is  said  to  hate!  As  soon 
as  the  silent  occupants  feel  their  carriage  moving,  and 
their  pedometer-legs  hit  by  the  spokes,  one  unending 
screech  is  set  up  in  a falsetto  truly  Chinese,  which 
draws  to  each  shop  door  along  the  route  every  grinning 
foki.  To  make  it  more  amusing,  not  a smile  spreads 
upon  the  dumb  faces  of  the  stalwart  drawers  whose 
shoulders  labor  under  the  long  cable.  Then  the  shop- 
men hoot  at  the  procession.  This  is  also  the  exact  pro- 
cedure when  the  courtezans,  wearing  their  hair  down 
their  backs  as  a sign,  walk  the  street  to  advertise  them- 
selves. Every  coolie  jeers,  spits  and  shouts  “ pig.” 
The  Chinese  attack  shame  with  its  most  dreaded  enemy, 
derision.  Devotees  present  pigs  to  the  Buddhist  shrine 
of  Honan,  opposite  Canton,  and  subscribe  a fund  to 
feed  the  animals  until  natural  death  ensues,  thus  rescuing 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE  147 

what  is  doomed  to  death,  which  affords  a merit  mark  in 
their  religious  practices. 

Who  can  juggle  like  a Chinese  conjurer!  There 
he  sits  where  the  narrow  streets  widen  into  a stone 
court;  like  a stone  thrown  into  a stream,  immediately 
there  is  turmoil  about  him.  He  draws  fire  from  his 
mouth,  or  a snake  from  your  pocket,  and  all  is  accom- 
panied by  a falsetto  jargon  which  makes  you  creep. 
These  conjurers  also  perform  the  miracle  of  the 
mango  tree.  The  mango  fruit  is  planted  in  a spot  which 
the  performer’s  wand  touches.  The  circle  gathers  round, 
and  shortly  a mango  tree,  forty  feet  high,  is  seen  in 
full  bloom  and  fruit.  As  this  appears  slowly,  and  in- 
distinctly at  first,  there  is  no  doubt  that  it  is  the  hyp- 
notism in  which  his  guild  and  the  Thibetans  excel,  and 
which  enables  them  so  to  influence  their  audience  that 
the  performer  seems  to  climb  up  a rope,  vanish  from 
view  in  the  sky,  and  when  the  spell  is  broken,  he  is  first 
seen  on  the  outside  of  the  circle.  This  work  is  all  per- 
formed while  he  incessantly  talks  and  fixes  his  eye  on 
any  recalcitrant  subject. 

The  most  sensational  performance  in  the  all-wonder- 
ful East  is  the  act  entitled : “ The  Murder  of  the  Child 
Lo.”  I witnessed  it  on  the  mountain  lawn  of  the  Royal 
Artillery  mess  at  Hong-Kong.  There  was  certainly  no 
subterranean  passage.  We  hemmed  in  the  performer. 
First  he  proceeded  with  snake  and  other  tricks,  until 
in  the  high  quiet  above  the  city,  the  attention  of  all  was 
riveted.  Near  him  on  the  grass  was  an  upturned  empty 
hamper.  Seated  at  our  feet  was  one  stray  Chinese  child. 
He  called  him ; seemed  soon  to  quarrel  with  him ; — 
some  one  said  it  was  the  conjurer’s  ward.  His  temper 
rose  as  the  child  seemed  to  be  obdurate.  With  a growl 


148 


THE  CHINESE 


of  a tiger  he  grasped  the  boy  and  threw  the  basket  over 
him.  Holding  it  with  one  hand,  he  muttered  solemnly; 
he  was  swearing  the  clan  vow  of  murder.  Before  we 
realized  it,  he  drew  a sword,  and  thrust  it  again  and 
again  through  the  basket,  the  most  heartrending, 
smothered  cries  beneath  gradually  dying  to  the  death 
whimper.  From  the  sword  seemed  to  drip  blood.  The 
conjurer’s  mad  eyes  gleamed.  He  leaned  on  his 
sword,  as  satisfied  with  his  work  as  one  possessed  of  a 
fiend.  In  the  awful  silence,  we  looked  from  the  terrace 
to  the  heathen  hills  where  rules  the  Abrahamic  code  that 
a child  always  belongs  to  its  parents,  even  for  death  if 
so  decreed.  There  was  a general  sigh,  and  a flutter  like 
leaves  as  he  released  us  from  the  spell  of  hypnotism. 
Returning  reason  made  us  try  to  reach  him,  to  avenge 
the  brutality.  He  anticipated  this;  he  kicked  the  basket 
over.  There  was  nothing  beneath  it.  A terrible  silence 
settled  down  and  held  our  hands.  We  looked  at  one  an- 
other, all  believing  that  this  was  a magician,  instead  of  a 
rascal,  like  unto  whom  there  was  never  an  equal.  The 
child  had  vanished  like  air,  and  the  dry  wicker  was  as 
empty  as  it  first  had  been  when  we  gathered  round  it 
on  the  lawn.  The  magician  had  no  assistants  among 
us.  Suddenly  the  child,  with  a cry  of  joy,  burst  from 
our  midst  into  the  arms  of  the  wonder-weaver.  We 
had  seen  the  most  famous  act  of  legerdemain  in  the 
world,  and  understanding  it  not,  but  having  experienced 
it,  declare  it  to  have  been  hypnotism. 

Ofif  the  banks  of  the  many  canals  little  basins  have 
been  cut,  which  latter  are  private  property,  though  the 
government  furnishes  the  canal  water  free.  There  are 
one  hundred  cases  in  the  Yamen  courts  on  water  rights 
to  one  of  any  other  cause.  The  basins  are  fenced  off 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


149 


with  bamboo  lattices  sunk  to  the  bottom,  and  are  used 
for  duck  and  fish  pools,  and  lily-root  farms.  Species  of 
lily  are  highly  esteemed  articles  of  food;  the  roots  are 
also  candied  as  bon-bons  for  the  ladies.  The  stems  are 
used  in  medicine,  and  the  leaves  for  packing,  or  for 
adobe  plastering.  Nothing  of  nature’s  productions 
escapes  the  grasp  of  the  utilitarian  Chinese,  except  the 
fragrance  of  the  flowers. 

The  Imperial  color  is  red,  and  to  impress  the  Colonial 
Chinese  with  a sense  of  royalty,  foreign  governors,  as 
at  Hong-Kong,  Macao  and  Saigon,  have  uniformed 
their  chair  bearers  and  ’rickisha  runners  in  this  color. 
The  calling  card  is  red,  to  signify  joy  within  the  bounds 
of  dignity.  Sometimes  a mandarin  will  paper  a room 
with  these  cards,  to  show  his  popularity  with  callers. 
Throughout  Kwangtung  Province,  both  Hakka  and  Pun- 
tei  women  affect  black  or  mottled  headgear,  with  white 
and  pink  robes,  but  in  Szechuen  white  headgear  with 
blue  robes  are  almost  universal. 

If  you  own  a godown  (warehouse)  on  the  waterfront, 
and  appoint  a native  godownman  to  live  on  the  premises, 
you  will  be  surprised  if  you  visit  your  property  after 
working  hours.  The  cargo  junks,  with  their  loads  of 
gunnies,  have  sailed,  and  the  gangs  of  laborers  have  gone. 
A dozen  karojels,  or  dip  nets  stretched  on  bamboos,  are 
in  operation  from  the  Praya  wall,  and  your  godownman, 
in  a new  role,  is  walking  behind  the  operators  taking  his 
toll  of  fish  from  each  as  his  cumshaw  (commission). 
When  the  net  is  dropped,  bread  and  bait  are  thrown  into 
it.  The  fish  swim  over  the  net,  which  at  first  is  raised 
very  gently,  and  at  last  with  a rush.  The  catch  some- 
times consists  of  the  green  and  gold,  mosquito-larvae  de- 
vouring, Athorinides  minnows,  which  are  destined  to 


THE  CHINESE 


ISO 

play  a wonderful  part  in  cleansing  the  Orient  of  its 
dreaded  curse,  malaria. 

All  Chinese  music  is  weird  and  screeching.  They  say 
their  pleasure  comes  in  exciting,  not  in  soothing  the 
nerves.  They  have  flutes,  horns,  violins,  peipas  (gui- 
tars), shcngs  (mouth  organ  with  thirteen  reeds),  and 
table  harps  to  be  played  with  a loaded  feather,  which  last 
make  delightful  music  akin  to  our  mandolins.  Every 
business  hong  has  its  musical  corps  (just  as  we  organize 
company  baseball  clubs),  who,  in  the  evening,  are  sup- 
posed to  amuse  the  typan  (master),  who  lives  on  the 
story  above  the  comprador’s  apartment.  Seated  on  the 
counters,  which  at  night  are  also  their  beds,  the  fokis 
essay  with  a vengeance  discords  which  are  unquestionably 
disturbing  to  occidental  nerves,  but  for  that  reason  the 
phlegmatic  Chinese  find  them  exhilarating.  It  suggests 
to  them  untamed  passion,  and  all  the  savage  things  their 
race  could  do  if  they  willed,  and  which  they  have  not 
tried  since  Hung  Siu  Tsuen  started  to  march  from  his 
Kwangtung  village  to  Nanking,  with  stops  by  the  way 
which  are  ensanguined  for  ever  in  history. 

Stoutness  is  rare,  but  is  considered  honorable  in  a man 
and  beautiful  in  a woman.  The  most  noticeable  thing 
on  entering  the  Flowery  Forest  Monastery  at  Canton  is 
that  the  statues  of  the  five  hundred  disciples  of  Buddha 
were  given  to  corpulency,  and  the  god  himself  has  a line 
like  the  equator. 

At  the  time  of  an  eclipse,  the  villagers  deploy  into  the 
open  with  drums  and  every  other  instrument  that  will 
stand  pounding,  and  make  an  incessant  noise  which  is 
intended  to  frighten  the  earth  dragon  from  eating  up  the 
celestial  man  in  the  sun.  It  is  very  important  to  frighten 
the  dragon  back  to  his  lair,  because  his  quiescence  means 


CO^VRIOHT.  *y  OKOCftwOOO  A U^DCMWOOP,  N.y, 

Best  taste  in  dress.  A small-footed  woman  of  South  China. 


A Club  for  wealthy  Chinese;  members  watching  a play.  Teakwood 
tables  with  tops  of  marble  from  Yunnan  province ; 
water-pipes;  teacups;  fans. 


Co^vixoHT,  tv  v)NOi"wOOO  « m r. 


Mntlicrs  of  rulers  of  Cliina.  .\  grouj)  of  iManchu  women  at  I’ekiny. 
North  China.  Note  peculiar  liair-dressing ; long  one-])iece 
tunics,  unbound  feet  and  high  wooden  shoes. 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


peace  on  earth  and  prosperity  for  the  individual.  The 
Li  Pu  (Board  of  Rites)  considers  the  “ Saving  of  the 
Sun  or  Moon  ” a matter  of  sufficient  moment  to  occasion 
an  Imperial  decree.  Now,  whether  this  is  holiday- 
making, humor,  paternalism,  or  superstition,  is  open  for 
choice.  My  own  observation,  taken  even  among  the  very 
ignorant,  supports  the  belief  that  there  is  not  so  much  of 
the  last  named  in  the  occurrence  as  to  warrant  our  utter 
despisal  of  the  proceedings. 

Some  of  us,  when  the  old  monarchic  past  of  our  Euro- 
pean forefathers  haunts  us,  boast  of  our  Norse  and  Nor- 
man, our  Mayflower,  or  other  descent,  but  members 
of  the  simple  Hakka  tribes,  who  live  opposite  Hong- 
Kong,  keep  with  care  and  can  recite  veritable  trees  that 
root  back  infinitely  previous  to  our  oldest  families,  and 
when  you  look  at  a Hakka  woman,  with  her  quaint  hand- 
kerchief, instead  of  the  otherwise  universal  bamboo  hat 
over  her  head,  you  have  a feeling  that  she  is  unchanged 
from  the  woman,  who,  from  a higher  peak,  saw  Noah 
disembark ! 

Though  they  have  hookah  water-pipes,  the  most  popu- 
lar form  is  chibouk-shaped,  with  very  small  cups,  which 
only  hold  enough  tobacco  for  a few  puffs.  Matches  are 
not  in  general  use.  The  smoker  puts  the  bowl  of  his  pipe 
directly  into  the  smoky  nut-oil  lamp  that  is  for  ever  burn- 
ing on  deck,  counter  and  before  the  family  tablets.  The 
best  tobacco  is  grown  on  the  uplands  of  Szechuen.  It 
is  of  a mild  quality.  Kwangtung  is  developing  its  acre- 
age, as  Chinese,  versed  in  the  more  expert  culture  and 
curing  in  Manila,  return  to  their  native  land. 

The  word  home  in  the  Chinese  ideograph  repre- 
sents literally  a place  where  a full  dressed  man  may 
kneel  to  his  ancestral  tablets  under  his  own  roof.  The 


THE  CHINESE 


152 

native  house  is  generally  of  one  story,  built  around  an 
open  court  {yuan),  and  which  is  also  called  by  the 
fancy  name  of  Tien  Ching  (heavenly  well),  because 
the  stars  look  into  its  pool,  where  the  owner  has  placed 
the  gold  and  silver  fish  from  Lake  Tsau.  In  making 
an  arch,  an  adobe  support  is  first  built  up.  In  country 
places,  walls  are  built  higher  than  the  roof  so  as  to 
serve  as  a parapet  when  the  owner  protects  his  home 
from  pirates.  You  will  notice  at  every  door  that  the  red 
Mun  Pai  (census)  tablet  is  pasted  up  to  conform  with 
the  law,  and  in  the  kitchen  a red  slip  is  pasted  calling  for 
blessings  from  the  god  of  homes,  Tsao.  Indeed,  a man- 
darin’s red  Yamen,  with  its  placards,  looks  like  an  over- 
grown valise  back  from  a Cook’s  tour  of  continental 
hotels.  Cats  are  more  tolerated  than  loved,  the  natives 
calling  them  the  despised  name  of  Kia  Li  (house  fox). 
The  most  expensive  breed  is  from  Yunnan,  and  is  tail- 
less. 

Shrubs  and  chrysanthemums  are  dwarfed  and  pruned 
into  freakish  shapes,  sometimes  like  gowned  humans, 
with  porcelain  heads  and  hands  stuck  upon  the 
extended  branches.  The  effect  is  pleasing  and  unique. 
Greater  luxury  of  bloom  could  not  be  developed  than 
their  royal  lotus  and  peony.  Azaleas,  oleanders,  jasmine, 
camellia,  tuberoses,  and  orange  are  abundant  in  season. 
In  the  moist  climate  the  scent  of  the  flowers  is  cloying, 
some  foreigners  in  their  ennui  calling  it  “ the  eternal 
funeral  of  the  south.”  The  natives  excel  in  several 
branches  of  horticulture,  attacking  the  various  destructive 
scales  of  fruit  trees  with  parasites  which  die  as  soon  as 
the  pest  which  they  live  on  is  dried  up.  Parasites  to  at- 
tack our  purple,  red,  and  Florida  scales  have  recently 
been  imported  into  California  from  China.  At  night. 


•INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


153 


lanterns  are  hung  in  the  garden  to  delight  the  eye  of  the 
master  and  guest.  In  the  adobe  houses  of  Kansu  and 
Pechili,  niches  are  cut  in  the  solid  wall  to  hold  the  porce- 
lain or  metal  lamp,  which  merely  consists  of  a wick 
hanging  from  the  bean-  or  nut-oil  in  the  basin.  The  two 
rooms  are  bare  of  cupboards.  A bar  where  clothes  may 
be  hung,  stretches  across  one  end.  A long  shelf  near  the 
ceiling  holds  utensils,  vegetables,  etc.,  while  great  jars 
{kongs)  hold  various  pickles  and  soys.  Outdoors,  small 
low  tables  are  set  beneath  mats  spread  on  poles  to  afford 
shade,  and  in  contrast  with  Japan  you  notice  the  use  of 
chairs  made  of  bamboo. 

In  a rich  man’s  house,  there  is  a chapel  or  room  for  the 
ancestral  tablets,  for  a Chinese  father  is  both  patriarch 
and  priest.  There  are  no  idols  in  the  home,  and  from 
their  domestic  life  you  do  not  feel  that  you  are  indeed 
among  the  heathen.  You  are  really  won  to  the  sim- 
plicity and  honesty  of  their  ancestor-anniversaries  and 
remembrance,  for  we  Occidentals  do  a little  bit  of  this 
kind  of  worship  ourselves  when  we  have  a general  in 
the  alliance  or  a Covenanter  in  the  blood.  Though  this 
is  the  home  of  silks,  none  of  the  furniture  has  hangings 
or  upholstery  to  hold  dust.  Everything  is  smooth,  cool 
and  cleanly.  A bat  is  worked  in  the  panel  of  the  frieze, 
between  the  rooms,  to  signify  Sho  (long  life).  Cook- 
ing is  done  outside  the  house,  either  in  the  open  under 
a lean-to,  or  in  a separate  building  attached  to  the  coolie 
quarters  in  the  compound.  The  Shanghai  bath,  so  called 
by  foreigners  because  they  first  used  it  there,  but  really 
made  at  Nanking  or  Kau-chow,  compels  the  sitter  to 
double  up  like  a jack-knife.  It  is  of  brown  or  yellow 
porcelain.  The  stopper  is  a cork  set  into  a hole  placed 
in  the  edge  of  the  bottom. 


154 


THE  CHINESE 


When  the  weather  is  cold,  brasiers  or  hand  flues  are 
brought  in,  and  in  the  north  a permanent  brick  or  adobe 
flue  (called  a bang)  is  built  half  beneath  and  half  above 
the  first  floor.  On  this  the  members  of  the  family  sleep 
with  wooden  pillows  under  their  necks.  If  the  cover  is 
short,  it  is  pulled  over  the  shaven  head  and  not  the  inured 
feet.  At  Hong-Kong,  which  was  comparatively  chilly  in 
February  for  us  who  were  enervated  by  the  awful  south, 
when  we  had  occasion  to  go  back  to  our  offices  at  night  to 
despatch  a ship  at  daylight,  it  was  amusing  to  apprehend 
a dozen  of  our  coolies,  and  their  friends  called  in  from  the 
open  highways,  sleeping  upon  our  desks  and  counters  in 
this  morgue-like  fashion.  There  is  need  for  the  bang  in 
the  northern  provinces,  and  even  as  far  south  as  Hupeh, 
three  inches  of  snow  will  lie  on  the  ground.  In  the 
larger  inns  a special  room,  curtained  off,  is  reserved  for 
the  bangs.  There  is  an  aisle  in  the  center,  toward  which 
the  sleepers  place  their  heads.  Oiled  paper  is  used  to 
facilitate  the  entrance  of  some  light.  Reeds,  castor-oil 
plants,  and  matting  are  squeezed  into  the  walls  to  hold  the 
exceedingly  poor  plaster.  The  floor  and  outside  covering 
are  generally  adobe.  The  bang,  which  is  frequently  fed 
and  drawn  from  out  of  doors,  is  used  mostly  in  Man- 
churia, Pechili  and  Shansi.  South  of  Chili,  the  people 
depend  more  on  brasiers  and  clothes,  although  at  Ningpo 
the  thermometer  drops  as  low  as  twenty-four  degrees.  At 
Hong-Kong,  it  was  known  only  once  to  go  to  thirty-two 
on  the  Peak,  but  the  rawness  of  winter  in  the  south  is  as 
uncomfortable  as  colder  weather  in  the  drier  north.  The 
southern  Chinese  have  no  word  for  snow.  The  Kwang- 
tung  emigrant,  who  is  the  man  we  have  in  America, 
writing  home,  calls  it  “ sky  cotton.”  As  we  use  a hot- 
water  bag,  a Chinese  uses  his  charcoal  stove,  inserting 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


155 


it  in  his  pii-kai  (mattress),  under  his  vest,  or  up  his 
sleeve,  as  need  may  be  for  temporary  warmth.  Like  the 
Russian,  the  Chinese  peasant,  though  sleeping,  can  sniff 
asphyxiation  within  an  inch  and  yet  save  himself. 
Abundant  as  coal  is  in  Shansi  and  the  north,  the  dust  is 
utilized  by  being  worked  into  balls  with  clay  and  camel’s 
dung,  and  used  as  fuel  briquettes  in  the  small  hand- 
cooking stoves  which  are  made  at  Han-kau.  In  contrast, 
consider  our  waste  of  sawdust  and  coal-dust. 

The  Chinese  sojourner  at  an  inn  exercises  his  humorous 
propensity.  You  will  always  see  scribbling  on  the  walls, 
and  the  subjects  generally  are:  “ Guess  as  to  the  weight 

in  catties  of  the  rats  in  this  house “ Enter  your  name 
here  for  the  competition  as  to  which  guest  has  risen  with 
the  most  flea  or  bug  bites.”  The  roofs  in  Kiang-si  and 
the  two  Kwang  Provinces  are  made  of  tiles,  but  in  Hupeh 
reeds  are  used  for  a more  picturesque  thatch.  Mural 
decoration  is  done  by  the  use  of  wood  or  inlaid  tiles. 
Scroll  and  screen  work  are  abundantly  employed.  The 
Chinese  love  privacy.  The  first  indication  of  growing 
wealth,  is  to  add  another  foot  to  the  compound  wall, 
rather  than  an  addition  to  the  home  itself.  A son  meet- 
ing his  father,  kowtows  to  him  three  times  three,  with  his 
fists  closed  together.  The  superiority  of  their  filial  de- 
votion, they  attribute  to  the  great  superiority  of  their 
literature  for  children.  The  word  7nust  is  even  more  em- 
phatic than  in  the  discipline  of  a Covenanter,  or  a Crom- 
wellian Ironside.  When  about  to  depart  on  a journey, 
the  lord  of  the  house  stands  in  the  midst  of  his  family  on 
his  threshold,  and  looks  back.  A cup  of  tea  is  handed 
him  by  his  tin-fong  (second  wife),  if  he  has  one,  or  by 
his  wife  in  her  humility  as  servant  to  her  lord,  who  is  act- 
ing as  priest.  He  raises  the  cup  as  a salute  to  Tsao,  the 


THE  CHINESE 


156 

god  of  home,  and  a prayer  for  return.  He  drinks  it  as  an 
obeisance  to  god  Tien  of  the  heavens,  if  he  wills  that  he 
shall  never  come  back,  according  to  that  perfect  Con- 
fucian  Golden  Rule : “ Perform  each  act  and  use  each 

day  as  though  they  were  thy  last.”  If  it  is  a guest  who 
is  leaving,  the  host  does  not  say  “ good-by,”  but  “ ho- 
hang”  (go  slow),  which  is  a little  commentary  on  the 
condition  of  their  roads.  Instead  of  building  a proper 
foundation  for  the  road,  the  stone  blocks  are  fastened 
with  iron  clamps.  With  the  action  of  rain,  or  frost, 
what  was  meant  for  a road  becomes  often  a veritable 
cheval-de-frise ! 

Rich  merchants  frequently  leave  provision  in  their 
wills  for  a monumental  gate,  bridge,  inn  or  theater,  to 
be  erected  in  their  memory,  the  guild  being  trustee. 
All  these  works  are  considered  to  draw  trade  and  travel 
to  one’s  native  town.  The  Chinese  figure  of  speech 
expresses  the  significant  fact  that  their  home-maker,  and 
not  the  bachelor  lodger,  dignifies  the  urban  popula- 
tion, and  composes  the  beauty  and  safety  of  their 
society.  You  do  not  ask : “ How  many  people  in  this 

city  ? ” but  “ How  many  kitchens  within  these  honorable 
walls?  ” Upon  entering  the  house,  you  do  not  elect  where 
you  shall  sit,  but  advance  to  the  great  hall.  At  the  left 
of  the  teak  guest  table,  which  is  against  the  wall  under 
the  longest  Confucian  motto,  you  take  your  place  as  of 
right, — the  host  sitting  on  the  right,  since  we  are  re- 
versed in  all  things.  There  are  chairs  down  the  hall  on 
the  left  and  right,  where  you  gradually  ascend  or  descend, 
according  to  the  rank  of  the  departing  or  arriving  guests. 
Thin  mother-of-pearl  shells  are  set  in  wooden  frames, 
and  used  for  the  windows  of  the  saloon  of  the  mandarin’s 
house-boat,  and  for  the  windows  of  the  better  class  of 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


157 


houses,  the  hinge  of  the  window  being  at  the  top  and  the 
prop  at  the  bottom.  The  glaring  sun  is  softened  won- 
derfully, and  the  heat  is  tempered  somewhat.  Marble 
and  even  granite  are  cut  in  slabs,  and  set  in  the  seats  of 
their  black-wood  chairs,  not  only  for  ornament,  but  for 
coolness.  At  the  same  time  that  the  foundation  of  the 
home  is  being  dug,  a spot  is  selected  where  to  dig  in  the 
center  of  the  court,  before  the  women’s  hong,  a lakelet  for 
the  goldfish. 

Outside  Tsianfu,  the  capital  of  Shensi  Province,  is  a 
blufif  of  cliff  dwellings  where  Tartar  families  live,  and 
which  they  fortified  against  the  last  Mohammedan  rebel- 
lion. It  was  not  preference  but  safety  which  chose  the 
location,  which  may  throw  light  upon  the  raison  d’etre 
for  scattered  cliff  dwellings,  whether  in  Africa  or  New 
Mexico.  In  the  great  drought  famine  of  1901,  when  the 
treacherous  Hoang-ho  dried  up  like  a bone,  three  hun- 
dred thousand  starving  Shensi  people  came  up  to  the 
provincial  capital,  and  on  being  refused  admittance  to 
the  overcrowded  city,  they  dug  with  their  hands  caves  in 
the  loess  cliffs,  so  that  their  emaciated  bodies  might  lie 
out  of  the  way  of  the  feet  of  men  and  camels.  Let  us 
admit  the  analogy, — cats,  dogs,  and  even  human  bodies 
were  as  scarce  in  the  streets  of  Tsian  Fu  as  they  were 
in  the  streets  of  La  Rochelle  in  1628,  and  the  obvious 
reason  shows  again  how  men  are  all  akin  under  any  color 
of  skin  when  the  same  kind  of  trouble  meets  them.  The 
red  banks  of  the  Min  near  the  capital  of  Szechuen,  and 
down  the  river  as  far  as  Sui  Fu,  also  show  cliff  dwellings. 
The  valley  of  the  Chu  Lung  River  in  Pechili  Province 
exhibits  similar  dwellings,  set  as  irregularly  in  the  cliff 
as  swifts’  nests. 

Doors  are  not  made  to  open  on  hinges  but  along 


THE  CHINESE 


158 

grooves.  Into  the  farthest  nooks  of  China,  our  clocks, 
called  “ iron  crickets,”  have  gone.  They  do  not  attempt 
to  regulate  them,  for  the  sun  only  is  relied  on  for  time. 
Our  clock  is  appreciated  as  a toy,  for  the  sake  of  the 
revolution  of  the  hands,  the  ticking  like  an  insect’s,  and 
particularly  the  bells,  whose  striking  apparatus  they  call 
the  “ Melican  lark.” 

In  the  south,  bars  are  set  perpendicularly  in  sockets, 
instead  of  a door  being  used  on  the  street,  and  the  liikong 
on  patrol  is  afforded  a view  of  the  inside  of  the  closed 
shop.  The  windows,  however,  are  closed  with  shutters. 
These  door  bars  are  often  beautifully  lacquered  and  gilt. 
This  use  of  bars,  set  farther  apart,  however,  is  conspicu- 
ous at  the  great  prisons,  such  as  at  Canton’s  Yamen, 
where  the  prisoners  in  cangues  look  like  so  many  zoo  in- 
habitants on  exhibition  in  their  various  kinds  of  torture. 
The  purpose  is  to  admit  air,  or  there  would  be  no  prison- 
ers for  the  coming  Assizes  in  so  hot  a countiy.  Flat  locks 
are  not  manufactured.  The  Chinese  lock  is  a brass  pad- 
lock, long,  narrow,  and  with  the  keyhole  in  the  end. 
When  shut,  it  looks  like  a miniature  ark.  It  snaps  with- 
out the  use  of  a key.  The  long  key  which  pushes  the 
spring  out,  is  either  our  double  “ L,”  or  letter  “ E.”  The 
security  of  the  lock  depends  on  the  length  of  the  key,  a 
three-inch  insertion  being  necessary  before  the  springs 
of  the  smallest  locks  can  be  reached.  The  lock  is  never 
cast,  but  is  made  of  seven  pieces,  carefully  joined  by  in- 
terlocking, sweating  and  solder.  A collection  of  these 
locks  is  worth  while,  for  the  sake  of  the  artistic  brass 
hammering.  The  key  is  a cumbersome  affair.  It  sets 
into  its  case  like  a jack-knife.  Each  key  has  a ring. 
When  a foki,  having  locked  his  master’s  camphor-wood 
boxes,  door-bars,  and  window  shutters,  wends  his  way 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


159 


homeward,  he  is  undeniably  a literal  illustration  of  the 
Paulist  man  of  “ sounding  brass  and  tinkling  cymbal,” 
but  from  his  excellent  accord  with  his  neighbors,  and  his 
long  patience  in  family  matters,  I have  no  doubt  he 
eminently  possesses  (heathen  though  he  is)  that  charity 
which  was  in  the  same  scriptural  verse  recommended  to 
the  Corinthians  instead  of  metal. 

The  Chinese  taste  in  spectacles  demands  a wide  tortoise 
rim  around  the  glasses,  and  for  the  ear  bridges,  so  that 
your  distinguished  and  learned  friend  is  a perpetual 
caricature  of  a walking  chauffeur. 

Social  letters  are  marked  on  the  envelope  with  a char- 
acter indicating  whether  the  news  is  of  social  felicitation, 
business  fortune  or  condolence,  so  that  the  recipient  is 
immediately  prepared.  In  Thibet  the  custom  is  more 
elaborate,  silk  ribbon  being  attached  to  the  missives  to 
indicate  both  the  message  and  the  rank  of  the  sender. 
Between  regular  correspondents  a motto,  mutually  under- 
stood, is  affixed  instead  of  the  name,  a significant  com- 
mentary on  the  courier  and  postal  service.  Your  Chinese 
merchant  is  a born  conservative. 

It  is  considered  social  and  business  manners  never  to 
refuse  a request  directly,  but  to  give  a conciliatory  reply, 
and  the  following  day  to  send  an  excuse  that  something 
untoward  connected  with  the  gods,  or  one’s  relatives, 
prevents  a compliance.  Occidentals  call  this  lying,  but  it 
is  the  national  code  of  politeness  which  has  fostered  the 
custom  which  they  call:  “ respectfully  saving  your  face.” 
They  would  never  think  of  asking  you  to  pay  a debt  in 
set  language,  but  rather  for  a “ return  loan.”  The  man- 
ners of  the  servants  constantly  lead  them  to  be  misunder- 
stood. A coolie  never  resigns  your  service;  he  asks  for 
leave  to  visit  his  father’s  grave.  It  would  be  impolite  to 


i6o 


THE  CHINESE 


tell  you  direct  that  he  was  leaving.  He  sends  you  a sub- 
stitute without  your  asking  him  to  do  so,  which  means, 
if  you  understood  him,  that  he  has  secured  better  em- 
ployment, and  that  he  has  a cousin  to  whom  he  wishes 
you  to  teach  English. 

As  the  elephant  is  sacred  in  Siam,  the  tortoise  is  sacred 
in  China,  but  it  has  never  secured  the  popularity  of  the 
mythical  beasts,  the  four-clawed  dragon  and  the  grotesque 
lion,  which  one  sees  sculptured  in  stone  at  every  temple 
stairway  throughout  China  and  Korea.  The  blue  spot 
on  the  Imperial  standard  set  just  before  the  ravenous 
teeth  of  the  dragon  is  the  famous  mythical  pearl  which 
he  is  said  to  be  always  striving  after,  but  never  secures. 
This  is  not  meant  to  convey  the  futility  of  empire,  but 
rather  our  idea  of  “ Exscrtens,  perpetua.”  In  the  lan- 
tern procession  a round  transparency,  to  represent  the 
same  idea,  is  carried  in  front  of  the  wriggling  beast, 
which  manoeuvers  on  human  legs. 

Curiously  like  the  Mosaic  and  Romaic  customs,  the 
fixed  laws  of  China  are  carved  on  stone  and  set  up  in  the 
streets.  Chinese  criminal  law,  which  is  founded  on  the 
“ Chau  Kung,”  or  Ritual  of  Chau,  is  based  upon  the  ac- 
cused confessing,  and  no  punishment  can  ensue  until 
this  is  brought  about, — all  so  far  removed  from  the  hu- 
maner  English  law,  where  even  the  Bench  advises  that 
the  prisoner  need  say  nothing  to  incriminate  himself,  and 
the  action  of  our  juries  in  throwing  out  of  court  confes- 
sions obtained  by  private  detective  agencies,  working  for 
“ secret  ” rewards,  through  starving  and  “ sweating  ” the 
prisoner.  Until  the  late  courageous  reforms  of  VVu  Ting 
Fang,  torturing  was  resorted  to  in  all  cases  before  much 
trouble  was  taken  to  collect  evidence,  and  naturally  a 
starved  and  persecuted  victim  confessed  to  anything. 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


i6i 


Before  the  condemned  are  decapitated,  they  are  offered 
all  the  saimchu  they  desire  to  drink,  and  in  most  cases 
they  are  allowed  to  choose  whether  they  will  ride  in  a 
’rickisha  or  be  carried  in  a sedan. 

No  spot  of  the  earth  has  drunk  so  deeply  of  the  blood 
of  criminals  as  the  execution  court  near  the  Yamen  at 
Canton.  It  is  only  a blind  alley,  not  much  larger  than  the 
back  yard  of  one  of  our  tenements.  In  the  Taeping  rebel- 
lion, the  government  beheaded  fifty  thousand  men  here. 
It  is  stone-paved  and  sand-strewn.  Piled  against  the 
walls  are  immense  stone  jars,  which  are  reserved  to  hold 
the  pieces  of  the  bodies  of  the  next  dozen  victims  who  are 
lincheed  into  a thousand  pieces.  There  are  also  bamboo 
baskets,  in  which  will  be  carried  away  the  heads  of  exe- 
cuted pirates,  to  be  stuck  on  poles,  and  exhibited  in  the 
districts  where  they  were  a curse.  The  shade  of  Robes- 
pierre would  bloom  here  as  a violet  in  comparison  with 
the  ghostly  flower  of  this  human  shambles.  At  Pe- 
king the  execution  ground  is  merely  a part  of  the 
public  highway,  in  the  southwest  section,  near  the  palace 
chrysanthemum  gardens,  which  is  blocked  off  by  soldiers 
for  the  gruesome  occasion,  and  is  afterward  immediately 
given  back  to  the  passing  of  travel.  When  Vah  Kah 
Der,  the  notorious  outlaw,  was  executed  at  Soochow  on 
October  15th,  1906,  the  new  foreign  drilled  soldiers  filed 
on  the  parade  ground,  and  took  position  with  true  occi- 
dental precision  around  a ring.  Then,  moving  slowly  be- 
cause of  the  robes  worn,  came  a procession  of  high  offi- 
cials, who  seated  themselves  on  chairs  within  the  circle, 
the  leading  officials  taking  places  at  a long  table  under  a 
tent.  A deep  gong  sounded  from  the  Yamen  building. 
At  the  double  quick,  a company  of  Chinese  braves  or 
viceroy’s  retainers,  was  seen  advancing,  and  in  the 


THE  CHINESE 


162 

midst  was  the  chained  criminal,  carried  high  upon  a 
wicker  tray,  and  with  flags  pinned  to  his  new  tunic,  which 
the  State  provides  for  such  occasions,  denoting  the  mur- 
ders he  was  found  guilty  of.  The  circle  opened,  and  he 
was  cast  to  the  ground  in  a heap,  his  neck  pulled  forward 
by  the  queue,  and  all  was  over  apparently  with  unseemly 
haste.  The  short,  thick  sword,  Tai  Fo,  is  first  heated 
in  water,  before  the  single  stroke  is  given.  Political  ex- 
ecutions in  Korea  as  late  as  1882,  were  performed  by 
bullocks  tearing  the  victims  asunder. 

Oaths  are  of  three  kinds,  the  most  solemn  being  to  go 
out  in  the  open  air  and  kowtow  to  the  skies  of  god 
(Tien),  and  to  the  earth,  when  the  blood  of  a white  horse 
and  a black  ox  (Fan  Niu)  are  spilled  from  cups,  as  a 
libation  to  god  and  to  creation’s  telluric  principle  respect- 
ively. Outside  some  of  the  villages,  in  a clearing  in  a 
grove,  a low,  wide  stone  altar  is  built  for  this  ceremony. 
The  other  oaths  are  breaking  a jar,  which  is  a vow  by  the 
earth,  our  mother;  and  chopping  off  a cock’s  head,  which 
is  swearing  by  the  blood  of  life.  This  last  is  permitted 
by  the  English  law  courts  of  Hong-Kong  and  Singapore. 
The  shedding  of  a cock’s  blood  is  sometimes  used  to  sol- 
emnize a curse.  In  Hupeh  Province  a cock  whose  throat 
has  just  been  cut  is  dashed  against  the  bow  of  a vessel  go- 
ing down  the  ways  at  a launching.  In  the  service  of  the 
secret  societies  a white  cock  is  killed  and  the  following 
execration  repeated : “ May  the  unfaithful  and  disloyal 
perish  like  this  cock.”  An  amusing  answer  was  made  in 
Pidgin-English  in  the  Hong-Kong  courts  where  a Chinese 
was  asked  concerning  his  preference  for  the  Chinese  or 
English  method  of  taking  the  oath;  “ Oh,  allee  samee  my, 
kill  ’im  cockee;  break  ’im  jugee;  smell  ’im  bookee!  ” The 
oaths  of  secret  societies  are  in  addition  written  and  then 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


163 


burned  before  the  god’s  image,  that  he  may  in  the  spirit 
world  punish  perjurers.  The  most  solemn  altar  is  that 
of  the  Temple  of  Heaven  at  Peking,  which  is  dearer  to 
the  Chinese  because  of  its  many  ravagings  by  foreigners. 
Here  the  High  Priest,  the  Emperor,  bows  before  the 
High  God,  or  “ Shang  Ti.”  At  the  foot  of  the  altar  are 
iron  censers,  in  which  are  burned  the  names  of  all  ex- 
ecuted criminals,  as  a witness  that  the  law  of  Heaven  has 
been  enforced  on  earth. 

China’s  hope  of  abolishing  the  usurpation  of  her  courts 
by  foreign  consuls  and  judges  in  extra-territoriality  re- 
gimes, depends  entirely  upon  the  success  of  Wu  Ting 
Fang  and  his  successors  in  their  enthusiastic  work  to 
bring  the  country’s  code  (Pai  Yang  Kuan),  and  the  new 
Fah  Pu  (Justice  Board)  to  approach  nearer  to  occidental 
practices.  In  this  work  Wu  was  assisted  by  the  advice 
of  Professor  Magozo,  D.  C.  L.,  of  Tokio  University. 
The  code  now  in  use,  and  older  than  Solomon,  is  not 
lacking  in  statutes.  If  anything,  the  laws  are  too  severe. 
In  the  aim  to  deter  crime  the  Justinians  of  China  over- 
stepped themselves  by  making  the  punishments  so  severe 
that  the  mandarins,  fearing  the  local  fuyins  (people’s 
mayors),  and  the  populace,  do  not  dare  to  apply  them. 
What  is  wanted  in  most  cases  is  a less  severe  punishment, 
but  its  unfailing  application.  It  was  the  severity  of  the 
laws  of  Leviticus  which  nullified  their  application.  The 
following  peculiar  punishment  was  inflicted  at  the  assizes 
of  Chantseun  in  Kwangtung  in  September,  1907.  A 
military  official  who  had  blackmailed  a boat  captain,  was 
compelled  to  wear  for  three  days  in  full  view  of  his  fellow 
officers  an  arrow  which  had  been  run  through  his  ear. 
Afterward  he  was  committed  to  jail  for  ten  years,  in  the 
laudable  endeavor  to  drive  injustice  from  the  rivers,  and 


164 


THE  CHINESE 


gain  maritime  Hong-Kong’s  approval,  for  she  is  rapid  to 
complain  and  pull  diplomatic  turmoil  around  the  ears  of 
Peking.  The  mob  has  been  known  to  resent  an  unpopu- 
lar decision  by  rushing  upon  the  magistrate  and  pulling 
off  his  long  boots,  or  placing  his  official  chair  on  the  top 
of  a bonfire,  as  a dare  for  him  to  resent  it.  The  old 
code  covers  fourteen  thousand  incidents  and  precedents 
in  the  following  divisions:  Criminal;  Sumptuary;  De- 

fense; Military;  Public  Works;  Ceremonial;  Judicial; 
Religious;  Fiscal  and  Family.  It  is  proposed  to  sepa- 
rate the  civil  and  criminal  procedures.  The  changes  in 
mandarins  are  so  frequent  that  the  law  is  really  in- 
terpreted by  a local  hanger-on  of  the  court,  who  is  not 
in  the  Civil  Service,  and  who  receives  fees  from  both 
judge  and  criminal.  Here  is  the  bed  of  the  bribery  sys- 
tem. Judges  should  serve  longer.  District  attorneys 
should  be  appointed  by  the  municipalities  and  barristers 
should  be  registered.  Juries  should  be  instituted. 

The  most  serious  crime  in  the  old  code  is  that  of 
striking  a parent,  the  punishment  for  which  is  Ling- 
chih  (cutting  into  one  thousand  pieces),  but  then  the 
Semitic  law  (Exodus  21;  17)  prescribed  death  as  the 
penalty  for  cursing  a parent.  Ling-chih  is  practised 
throughout  the  stern  south.  In  November,  1907,  two 
women  were  thus  cut  to  death  at  Swatow,  and  it  is  a 
weekly  occurrence  at  Canton.  The  lightest  punishment 
is  wearing  the  cangue  all  day,  while  being  starved.  This 
wooden  collar  weighs  twenty-six  pounds,  and  soon  throws 
the  victim  head  downward,  where  he  lies  as  a prostrated, 
exhausted  wretch.  When  we  inveigh  against  the  many 
causes  for  beheading  in  the  Chinese  criminal  code,  we 
should  reflect  that  no  longer  ago  than  Tudor  times,  Lon- 
don Bridge  not  infrequently  had  two  hundred  heads  ex- 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


165 


posed  at  one  time  on  its  piers.  Wu  fought  to  introduce 
trial  by  jury  in  capital  cases,  and  the  Hong- Kong  British 
jury  of  seven  is  exerting  a powerful  example  in  the  mat- 
ter. From  juries  to  parliaments  and  parties,  the  steps 
are  short,  and  then  shall  not  men  wonder  if  Liberty  has 
any  more  fields  to  conquer,  but  let  us  not  worry.  Liberty 
is  a thing  that  rusts,  and  it  is  nearly  as  hard  to  keep  the 
pan  clean  as  to  buy  a new  one.  If  China  gets  juries,  she 
will  in  this  excel  Japan’s  judicial  system,  for  Japan  has 
none.  We  can  not  altogether  disbelieve  in  China  when 
we  consider  that  in  the  long  run  that  government  which 
does  wrong,  falls,  and  History  never  raised  her  voice  with 
such  approval  as  in  this  case.  The  fat  old  days  of  official 
corruption  when  a viceroy  like  Li  Hung  Chang,  clothed 
like  a beggar  to  deceive  the  assessors,  could  die  worth 
a billion,  and  when  mandarins  would  steal  the  soldiers’ 
grain  to  the  last  too,  and  then  burn  the  granary  down  to 
obliterate  trace  of  the  loss,  are  departing,  never  to  dawn 
in  China  again  in  such  lurid  shame.  In  the  draft  of  the 
new  laws,  it  is  prohibited  for  newspapers  to  recount  crime 
at  length,  as  sensationalism  is  believed  to  inflame  more 
crime. 

It  is  not  likely  that  China  will  yet  abolish  capital 
punishment  for  the  purloining  of  fiduciary  funds  or  for 
bribery.  It  is  also  probable  that  the  court  eunuchs  at 
Peking  will  be  dismissed.  The  intriguing  of  these  effemi- 
nates has  always  been  dangerous  to  crown  and  ministers. 
A native  wit  advises : “ Keep  your  spirit  out  of  hell, 

and  your  face  out  of  court.”  The  people  hate  lawyers 
as  they  now  know  them.  They  have  many  a sobriquet 
and  witticism  concerning  their  calling : “ Rats  under 

the  Bench “ Cash  drops  into  a lawyer’s  paw  as  a sheep 
falls  into  a tiger’s  claw “ Those  who,  when  they  pluck 


THE  CHINESE 


1 66 

the  bird’s  feathers,  take  the  skin  too,”  etc.,  etc.  It  is 
among  this  class  that  China’s  poverty  and  misery  have 
groveled.  Ever  too  poor,  with  her  low  taxation,  to  equip 
her  courts  with  lictors,  clerks,  marshals  and  pleaders, 
the  hangers-on  offered  to  do  the  work  for  the  privilege 
of  settling  the  fee  privately.  They  have  been  the  tax 
gatherers.  Has  this  privilege  corrupted  them  and  better 
than  they  ? What  did  more  to  corrupt  the  great  Equites 
class  of  the  Roman  Republic  than  this  opportunity  for 
extortion  ? A State  can  not  shirk  to  class  its  responsibil- 
ities, and  at  the  same  time  be  sure  of  delegating  its 
honor.  The  result  has  been  “ squeeze,”  blackmail  and 
bribery,  and  the  mandarin,  in  the  poverty  of  his  equip- 
ment, has  been  forced  to  be  satisfied  with  enunciating 
the  law, — not  enforcing  it.  ] 

The  notoriety  about  offices  being  purchased  does  not  » 
apply  to  China’s  civil  service.  The  tax  gatherers  and  * 
unlicensed  counsel  would  prefer  their  own  purchased  ' 
opportunities,  to  the  salary  of  a mandarin.  When  their  ’ 
purse  is  low,  these  pettifoggers  hire  rascals  to  charge 
their  fellows  with  crime  and  contempt,  and  see  to  it  that 
the  mill  of  shame  has  grist  come  to  it  from  the  black- 
mail of  their  fetid  imagination.  It  is  these  so-called 
lawyers  who  have  blindfolded  Justice  in  Kwangtung  in 
her  search  for  pirates,  and  therefore  America  and  Europe 
have  an  interest  in  encouraging  China  to  clean  up  the 
Augean  stables  of  her  courts.  From  ten  thousand 
villages  where  the  barns  and  tax  receipts  are  burned  by 
these  rascals;  from  the  bleached  bones  in  the  mountain 
pas.ses  of  those  who  were  decoyed  and  murdered  to 
obtain  the  rewards  offered  by  rich  brutes  who  laughed 
at  the  law  of  their  country;  from  ten  thousand  liti- 
gants whose  cases  have  never  reached  the  judge  but 


A 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


167 


been  bandied  from  one  lawyer  to  another;  from  thou- 
sands of  daughters,  kidnapped  by  these  lictors  to  keep 
strife  and  sorrow  active;  from  the  relatives  of  the 
murdered,  and  the  ravaged  homes  of  the  plundered  every- 
where in  the  patient  land,  swells  the  plea  that  the  courts 
be  equipped,  even  at  increased  taxes,  and  that  the  lawyers’ 
clique  of  extortion  be  extirpated  for  ever  in  a vitalized 
patriotism  among  their  successors.  A similar  condition 
of  lawyers  studying  the  law’s  evasion  for  the  fattening 
of  certain  money-changers  existed  in  Palestine  in  the 
time  of  Christ.  Success  then  to  Wu  and  his  successors 
in  their  radiant-hued  reforms  in  judicial  ethics. 

Yung  Ching  writes:  “ Happy  are  we  when  the  judge 

can  sleep  undisturbed  in  the  court,  and  when  the  villager’s 
door  is  no  longer  pecked  at  night,  as  by  a hungry  hawk, 
by  the  collector  of  double  taxes.  What  joy  is  equal  to 
that  of  seeing  the  backs  of  blackmailing  lawyers  and  lic- 
tors passing  through  your  outer  compound?  Litigation 
is  suing  a flea  and  getting  a bite  for  justice.”  What  could 
better  prove  that  the  hearts  of  this  people  are  attuned  to 
trust  law,  than  the  following?  In  October,  1907,  a white 
explorer,  one  Deminil,  killed  a Chinese  soldier  who  was 
resisting  his  entrance  without  passports  into  Thibet  at 
Batang.  The  mob,  even  in  this  wild  country  of  the 
Kincha  Valley,  where  they  will  probably  never  hear  that 
justice  has  been  meted  out,  suffered  the  prisoner  to  be 
taken  by  the  military  mandarin  two  thousand  miles  away, 
to  stand  trial  in  the  extra-territorial  American  court  at 
Shanghai.  If  we  admit  that  the  Chinese  people  are  the 
poorest  the  world  has  known;  that  they  have  borne  that 
poverty  the  longest  with  perfect  philosophy  and  orderli- 
ness, and  not  out  of  ignorance  or  dullness;  that  they 
never  neglect  the  old  and  are  charitable  even  to  giving 


THE  CHINESE 


1 68 

their  all  repeatedly  in  their  lives,  yet  never  rebelling 
against  the  barbed  confines  of  an  inexorable  duty  which 
is  sterner  and  wider  than  the  Greek’s  idea  of  the  virtue, 
we  must  admit  they  are  the  grandest  race  the  Creator 
looks  on,  and  that  it  is  a greater  spectacle  than  a man 
rising  from  poverty  to  affluence  in  a land  of  greater  op- 
portunity, such  as  ours.  It  is  what  we  bear,  not  what 
we  win,  which  is  greatness. 

In  the  government  of  the  four  hundred  clans,  and  the 
village  and  district  life,  the  elders  over  sixty  years  of  age, 
and  the  graduates  (of  whatever  age)  of  the  literary  ex- 
aminations, form  one  council  or  Shan-sze,  under  a fuyin 
(mayor),  or  tepao  (dean)  of  their  own,  and  China  in 
this  way  has  been  under  democratic  rule  from  time  im- 
memorial, for  the  mandarin  seldom  interjects  his  author- 
ity. These  elders  are  to  be  addressed  as  laoye  (sir), 
which  is  the  respect  paid  a low  judge.  The  piko  of 
the  kindred  Mongolians  takes  charge  of  the  clan  councils 
with  the  power  of  a chief,  though  in  his  case,  confirmation 
must  be  obtained  from  the  “ Board  of  Colonies  and  Cen- 
sure ” at  Peking.  The  government  tax  is  paid,  and  the 
land  is  divided  up  among  the  highest  bidders,  by  the 
council.  Taxes  are  evaded,  especially  by  mandarins,  by 
a concealment  of  wealth.  Li  Hung  Chang  was  notorious 
for  this  lack  of  patriotism.  Said  one  of  his  kind : 
“ Would  the  otter  have  been  killed  if  he  had  not  shown 
his  rich  hide?”  The  Shui-li  (land  tax),  which  is  now 
five  cents  a mao  (six  mao  an  acre),  the  government  hopes 
to  raise  to  eight  cents,  in  conformity  with  a plan  sub- 
mitted by  Robert  Hart,  lately  their  adviser.  In  com- 
parison, the  Japanese  tax  on  poorer  land  is  at  present 
fifteen  cents  a mao.  We  need  say  no  more  to  reveal  the 
potentiality  of  dormant  China.  When  drought  visits  the 


CO^VKIUKT,  ev  UNOgRWOOO  A n.  * 

Chinese  bridge  at  Soochow,  Kiang-su  province.  East  China,  ^^’ash- 
women  and  houseboats. 


Chinese  justice  for  theft  nf  fin  • r 


A funeral  procession  with  honorarv  I 

on  tile  street  wliich  run^  ' ' i l>‘'i'^sin.s,r  fora^t 

A’orth  C hina.  Tlu>  (lark  v'mlt tV' 

-'i.y  IS  at  the  ri,.ht  of  ,l,e  picture. 


Afittii,.-,. 


. 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE 


169 


land,  oftentimes  the  peasants  carry  their  plowshares  to 
the  plaza  in  front  of  the  yamen,  and  cast  them  in  a heap 
as  a mute  intimation  to  the  mandarin  that  it  would  be 
inhuman  to  levy  the  land  tax,  when  the  share,  sowing 
and  sweat  have  brought  no  harvest.  The  land  tax  in 
Szechuen  Province,  by  an  ancient  agreement  at  the  time 
of  its  repeopling,  is  the  lowest  in  China,  and  the  province 
is  the  most  populous  and  richest,  which  is  a glorious 
illustration  of  the  wisdom  of  not  taxing  necessities,  but 
rather  reaching  out  after  luxuries  to  support  government. 
Family  disputes,  debts,  wayward  youths,  village  works, 
wells,  lawsuits  (most  of  them  on  water  rights),  celebra- 
tions, processions,  and  the  clan’s  policy  toward  other 
clans,  and  the  government  as  represented  in  the  manda- 
rin, Taotai  and  viceroy, — are  all  controlled  by  the  coun- 
cil. Six  clans  send  all  the  emigrants  to  America.  Their 
names  are  Sam  Yup;  Yung  Wo;  Hop  Wo;  Yan  Wo; 
Kong  Chow,  and  Ning  Yung,  known  to  us  as  the  fa- 
mous “ Six  Companies”  of  San  Francisco. 

Speaking  generally,  emigration  from  the  village  to  the 
city  is  discouraged.  It  is  the  family  pride  that  the  sons’, 
and  the  sons’  sons’  houses  are  all  within  the  parent  com- 
pound. A popular  story  which  the  ’rickisha  coolies  chant 
from  their  pamphlets,  while  they  wait  for  their  masters,  is 
about  “ Chang  Kung  and  his  nine  generations  all  within 
one  wall.”  China  has  yearned  over  its  children  like 
Isaac.  She  has  loathed  the  emigration  barracoons  of 
Macao,  and  the  blue-funneled  coolie  ships  lying  off  the 
Prayas  of  Swatow  and  Hong-Kong.  An  exception  is  the 
emigration  to  Mongolia,  where  all  taxes  are  remitted 
for  five  years  to  Chinese,  the  government  considering  this 
the  most  effective  way  to  restrain  the  vexatious  and  un- 
certain Mohammedans,  and  the  troublesome  Mongols 


170 


THE  CHINESE 


who  have  acquired  their  wayward  habits.  The  clan  po- 
lices its  fields  from  the  depredations  of  Hakka  and  Miao- 
tse  vagrants.  You  will  notice  warnings  pasted  on  the 
sides  of  shrines  and  on  bulletin  boards.  Some  of  them 
warn  you  not  to  fill  in  a disused  well,  as  that  would  be 
unlucky.  The  clan  law  or  custom  prescribes  certain 
gleanings  of  grain  and  cotton  which  must  be  left  by  the 
reapers.  The  stubble  of  sorghum  must  not  be  cut  below 
a certain  height.  Rice  is  caught  in  the  hand  and  cut  by 
the  sickle  half-way  down  the  stalk,  while  in  the  northern 
provinces  the  whole  straw  of  the  millet  is  left  standing, 
the  ears  only  being  cut  out.  A gong  is  rung  from  the 
temple  porch  to  announce  that  the  clan  fields  are  open  to 
the  gleaning  of  the  poor  on  the  day  following.  Tres- 
passers convicted  by  the  council  are  consigned  to  the 
cangue  for  various  periods  during  harvest  time,  and  as 
they  are  generally  the  poor  and  opium  degenerates,  the 
punishment  of  being  incarcerated  during  gleaning  days 
is  a severe  one. 

In  the  more  complex  life  of  the  capital  or  Fu  cities, 
and  the  smaller  cities  of  Ting  and  Chau  ranks,  of  course 
Governors  General  (Tsung  Tuh)  and  Lieutenant  Gov- 
ernors (Liang  Kiang)  rule.  Altogether  the  organiza- 
tion of  departments,  districts,  provinces,  cities,  towns, 
villages  and  circuits  is  thorough  and  admirable.  The  lit- 
eral translation  of  chichaii  (district  mandarin)  is  “ know- 
er  of  his  district,”  indicating  the  sympathy  expected 
between  ruler  and  ruled,  from  the  Tsung  Tuh  down  to 
the  lowest  official,  the  siunkicn  (justice  of  the  peace).  A 
relic  of  barbaric  clan  life  exists  in  the  Yeung  Kong  dis- 
trict of  Kwangtung.  On  the  fifth  day  of  the  fifth  moon, 
the  men  of  two  villages  meet  in  a valley  and  line  up  on 
each  side  of  a stream  for  an  all-day  battle  with  stones  and 


INCIDENTS  OF  DAILY  LIFE  171 

slings.  The  battle  is  witnessed  by  visitors  from  sur- 
rounding villages.  As  men  are  struck  or  injured,  they 
are  carried  or  ruled  off  the  field.  Sometimes  one  thou- 
sand men  are  engaged  and  deaths  are  occasional,  though 
not  more  die  than  if  one  thousand  men  played  football. 
Similar  stone-throwing  contests,  set  for  stated  times  and 
the  settling  of  accumulated  clan  feeling,  are  not  uncom- 
mon in  Korea.  At  Seoul,  different  wards  of  the  city,  and 
in  Yunnan,  some  of  the  Shan  tribes  engage  in  these 
fights. 

The  paths  outside  of  the  treaty  ports  are  too  narrow  for 
even  the  ’rickisha,  and  so  the  wheelbarrow  is  the  passen- 
ger equipment.  It  is  not  an  infrequent  sight  for  a small- 
footed woman  to  be  balanced  by  a live  pig  securely 
strapped  to  the  other  half  of  the  barrow.  A sail  is  raised, 
the  shafts  are  lifted,  and  down  the  path  between  the  quiet 
rice  fields  the  comical  freightage  races,  for  the  sooner 
the  journey  is  over  the  better  for  the  one  to  whose 
shoulders  the  shafts  are  tied.  As  no  iron  is  used  in 
north  China  in  the  wooden  cart  wheels,  which  are  mor- 
tised, dovetailed  and  wedged,  after  one  has  washed  his 
face  in  a pan  at  a Gobi  desert  well,  the  precious  water 
must  be  poured  on  the  wheels  to  swell  them,  so  that  they 
will  not  fall  apart.  Vehicles  bearing  the  yellow  flag  have 
the  right  of  way;  they  are  carrying  Imperial  supplies.  It 
is  a marvelous  country  of  the  honorableness  of  little 
things.  No  man  has  much,  but  every  man  has  some- 
thing, and  is  drilled  to  find  that  something  a little  more 
than  sufficient,  for  little  pessimism  is  reflected  in  the  coun- 
try’s literature. 

The  elastic,  easeful  methods  of  the  race  will  be  under- 
stood by  their  having  no  word  to  express  hour,  minute 
or  to-morrow.  They  can  say  night  and  day,  but  they 


172 


THE  CHINESE 


must  use  a metaphor  from  nature  or  custom  when  they 
express  anything  shorter  than  kih  (fifteen  minutes) 
“ The  time  it  would  take  a turtle  to  crawl  a li  ” would 
be  half  a day.  “ The  time  it  would  take  a lark  to  swal- 
low a grasshopper  ” expresses  an  instant.  “ The  time 
you  would  get  shaved  ” indicates  half  an  hour.  “ The 
time  it  would  take  to  swallow  a good-by  cup  of  tea  ” 
expresses  two  minutes.  The  word  “ to-morrow  ” can 
only  be  expressed  by  an  affix  of  “ future  ” to  the  active 
verb. 

They  call  their  whisky  “ the  liquor  that  has  three 
fires”  (samschii),  and  the  inventor  of  this  distillation  of 
rice,  Ih  Tih,  is  referred  to  as  “ the  partner  of  the  devil  ” 
by  the  school  teachers.  The  liquor  is  always  taken  hot, 
and  the  idiom  for  saying,  “ I have  taken  a drink,”  is  “ I 
have  painted  my  face.”  The  propaganda  against  the  use 
of  wine  has  been  sedulously  and  effectively  pursued  since 
its  institution  by  the  second  king  of  the  Chau  dynasty, 
who  was  contemporary  with  David.  Their  effective  cru- 
sade against  drugs  (opium)  belongs  to  a much  later  date, 
even  the  twentieth  century. 


IV 


CHINESE  HUMOR 

Three  races,  and  three  races  alone, — the  American,  the 
Scotch  and  the  Chinese, — ► appreciate  and  constantly  use 
humor.  The  American,  divining’  the  point  like  a prophet, 
begins  to  laugh  ere  the  incident  is  fully  related;  the 
drolly  slow  Scot  does  not  chuckle  until  he  has  first 
rounded  the  humor  in  his  mind,  and  satisfied  himself 
that  it  is  true  coin.  The  stoical  Chinese  laughs  not  at 
all,  before  or  after,  but  next  day  in  sincerest  flatter)',  in 
his  wide  charity,  he  will  pass  your  story  along,  and  he 
and  his  will  trust  you  for  evermore,  because  for  a moment 
you  have  lightened  the  load  of  care  of  a fellow  mortal. 
All  three  races  live  life  very  seriously, — even  religiously, 
— and  welcome  that  forgiveness  of  attitude  which  clothes 
human  defects  with  the  smile  of  tolerance.  The  Chinese 
of  course  chiefly  selects  such  characteristic  subjects  as 
the  disappointment  of  the  father  of  ten  daughters  and 
no  sons;  the  husband  henpecked  by  his  last  wife  as  much 
as  by  his  first  two;  the  bonze  who  added  to  his  geomantic 
threatenings  and  discoveries,  as  famine  kept  the  people 
from  supplying  his  coffers;  the  discovery  of  an  honest 
tax-gatherer;  the  pig  trying  not  to  laugh  as  he  balanced 
the  proud  beauty  on  the  other  half  of  the  wheel-barrow; 
Truth  changing  the  inscription  on  a mandarin’s  honorary 
pailo  arch;  the  professional  mourner  saying  a cheerful 
“ hello  ” to  a friend,  though  his  purchased  tears  con- 
tinued to  flow ; etc.,  but  in  moods  like  those  which  follow 
he  approximates  close  to  our  points  of  view. 

173 


174 


THE  CHINESE 


The  Chinese  padlock  is  composed  of  a long,  thin 
brass  rod,  on  which  a clasp  slides.  The  usurer  of  China’s 
treaty  ports  is  generally  a Parsee,  who  intends  to  go 
home  to  Bombay  when  he  has  heaped  his  stack  of  ex- 
changed sovereigns  high  enough.  Into  Restonji  Jam- 
shed  j’s  shop  on  the  water  Praya  of  Hong-Kong  came 
Ng  Tso  Sui,  a debtor  in  whom  humor  ran  alongside  of 
dishonesty.  Overpowering  the  little  dark  man  in  the 
black  skull-cap,  he  took  out  his  large  ear-ring,  clapped 
in  the  brass  padlock,  and  then  offered  to  exchange  the 
key  of  the  latter  for  his  canceled  note.  No  Parsee  would 
dare  to  admit  to  his  caste  that  a heathen  had  ever  soiled 
his  person,  and  that  vagabond  and  boaster  Ng,  while 
his  fellows  lean  against  their  fish  poles  while  the  nets 
are  drying  on  the  Lamma  beach,  again  and  again  descants 
how  a locksmith  after  all  makes  the  best  fisherman. 

The  Hakka  boatmen  of  Kowloon  enjoy  nothing  better 
than  to  foment  their  women  into  ancestor-villifying 
“ Billingsgate.”  The  tongue  of  these  women  has  won 
for  them  the  captain’s  position  in  the  family  sampan. 
Off  Douglas  Pier,  Hong-Kong,  I saw  two  of  the  boats 
lying  sterns  together,  while  from  the  end  of  each  the 
respective  queens  of  vituperation  jargoned  and  alter- 
cated. When  the  wrath  was  at  its  height,  and  a hundred 
sampans  crowded  about  to  hear  the  contestants  extend 
their  curses  to  the  seventeenth  ancestor  (the  living  having 
been  consumed  early  in  the  conflagration),  the  two  hus- 
bands quietly  took  up  the  oars.  Jerking  the  boats,  they 
precipitated  the  Protean  warriors  overboard.  With  one 
wild  yell  from  the  departing  audience,  the  fray  was  im- 
mediately over,  and  rescued  Peace  settled  herself  in  the 
bedraggled  nest  of  humiliation. 

The  Chinese  valentine  which  expresses  the  greatest  in- 


CHINESE  HUMOR 


*75 


suit  is  the  one  in  which  a sea-turtle  is  represented.  Man- 
darin Chang  has  been  superseded  by  Mandarin  Chuen. 
Thereupon  Chang  mails  to  the  yamen  a picture  of  Chuen’s 
chair  borne  by  four  turtles  standing  erect  in  insolence, 
instead  of  turbanned  and  sashed  coolies.  The  Chinese 
consider  the  turtle  the  most  contemptible  animal,  and 
Chang  thereby  insinuates  that  he  considers  only  the 
lowest  of  animals, — much  less  a human  being, — lit  to 
be  near  the  person  of  his  rival  Chuen. 

A hungry  priest  is  not  averse  to  adopting  the  useful 
side  of  humor  when  his  homilies  fall  on  stony  ears. 
Buddhism  teaches  that  the  souls  of  men  come  back  and 
inhabit  animals.  The  priest  betakes  him  to  a parishioner 
whose  fears  he  knows  he  can  work  on,  but  it  must  be 
one  who  owns  a duck  yard.  Selecting  a conspicuous 
bird,  he  exclaims  that  he  knows  the  sainted  soul  of 
Farmer  Lun’s  father  has  come  back  and  inhabited  that 
bird  because  of  its  peculiar  shuffle,  “ just  like  the  literary 
old  man’s.”  Immediately  pious  Lun  asks  the  priest  if 
he  will  not  keep  the  bird  where  it  will  hear  the  monas- 
tery’s bells  of  prayer,  to  which  request  Pastor  Humor 
accedes,  and  later  introduces  its  victim  to  the  bell  of  a 
useful  doom. 

But  the  Chinese  with  all  his  courtesy,  which  is  by  the 
book,  can  enjoy  a little  humor.  When  Abbe  Hue,  the 
learned  Toulouse  monk,  was  traveling  from  Peking  to 
Thibet  in  1846,  he  was  occasionally  ill  at  the  yamens  of 
the  mandarins.  They  invariably  rolled  up  their  gift  of 
a yellow  lacquered  coffin  and  told  him  to  “ forsake  sad- 
ness and  behold  in  what  glory  he  would  die  away  from 
home.” 

The  East  Asia  Nezvs  of  Canton,  printed  in  the 
native  character,  having  cause  to  denounce  the  Taotai’s 


1/6 


THE  CHINESE 


policy  in  the  Yuet-Han  Railway  matter,  capped  their  ar- 
gument by  calling  this  high  official ; “ for  ever  a dizzy- 
headed  fish.” 

A cynic  argued  with  a humorist  that  even  the  holiest 
of  men  had  some  sinful  secret,  and  to  prove  it,  stuck 
haphazardly  in  a bonze’s  private  incense  pot,  a tablet  with 
the  words : “ Alas ! all  is  known,”  and  for  once  the 

humorist  was  defeated  by  the  bonze  decamping  in  the 
night  for  parts  unknown. 

On  the  long  bamboo  wharf  at  Wanchai,  coolies  in  line 
bore  coal  in  scoop-shaped  baskets  to  the  launches  which 
were  made  fast  to  one  side.  The  early  fish  boats  had 
just  brought  in  from  the  Lamma  shoals  their  supply  for 
the  Hong-Kong  market,  and  the  fishermen  were  busy 
balancing  on  their  shoulders  buckets  filled  from  the  tanks 
with  live  fish.  These  two  lines  of  men  worked  to  and 
fro  from  coal  godown  to  wharf,  and  from  market  to 
boats,  until  some  water  from  a fish-bucket  splashed  on 
the  sooty  leg  of  a coal  coolie.  His  leopard  spots  brought 
out  the  jeers  of  the  fish  clan,  for  the  labor  unions  are 
generally  made  up  of  one  family.  Jeers  led  to  names, 
and  curses  to  vituperation,  until  the  lines  of  men  dropped 
their  burdens,  and  faced  each  other  for  a battle,  first  of 
grandfathers’  adjectives.  Then  there  was  a rush,  and 
of  course  the  fishermen  were  the  Achilles  with  the  vul- 
nerable heel,  for  the  fish  were  precious  and  the  coal  was 
not.  The  coal  coolies  took  the  kicks  and  queue-pulling, 
while  they  emptied  their  filthy  baskets  into  the  fish- 
buckets.  A score  of  wide  Hupeh  grass  hats  were  left  to 
the  grinning  ebony  victors,  while  the  defeated  rushed  to 
their  boats  to  laundry  their  eels  and  garoupa. 

When  a Chinese  beggar  thanks  you  for  an  aim,  he 
always  says  “Taipan”;  that  is,  “May  you  be  the 


CHINESE  HUMOR 


177 


general  manager  of  your  firm,”  and  it  is  noticeable  that 
these  beggars  require  from  your  chair  coolie  the  address 
of  **  Laoyc”  (Sir),  before  they  will  get  out  of  the  way. 
The  coolies  give  this  term  of  respect  willingly,  for  there 
is  nothing  native  servants  dislike  so  much  as  profane 
or  abusive  language;  but  the  smile  on  the  face  of  the 
beggar  shows  that  he  is  enjoying  the  humor  of  the  salu- 
tation. 

A little  Hakka  girl,  who  was  carrying  her  brother 
papoose-fashion  on  her  back,  was  asked  “ Is  he  heavy?  ” 
and  she  replied : “ No,  he  is  my  brother.”  She  was 

not  thinking  of  the  humor  or  the  humanity  of  it,  but 
merely  questioning  the  adjective  used,  but  the  grin 'on 
my  ’rickisha  men’s  faces  showed  that  they  had  seen  the 
other  phase. 

In  the  Buddhist  monastery  of  the  Goddess  of  Mercy 
at  Canton,  I asked  a native  idler  for  an  explanation  of 
the  gilded  statue  of  the  goddess  Kun  Yam,  and  he  re- 
plied : “ Oh,  she  Chinee  woman  who  not  eat  rice  ever, 

but  can  eat  money  any  time.” 

Victoria  College,  an  institution  for  the  education  of 
native  youth  in  Hong-Kong,  while  reaping  glory  the 
world  over  with  its  graduates  in  the  diplomatic  service, 
is  sowing  humor  abundantly  through  its  sophomores. 
The  college  paper.  The  Yellow  Dragon,  contains  the 
following  letter  from  a pupil  to  his  father  at  Canton : 

“ Don’t  take  any  anxiety  for  me  gambling  and  wan- 
dering about  in  bad  habit  places.  I hope  you  will  not 
forget  to  send  me  those  few  dollar  for  to  pass  the  New 
Year  here  alone.  I find  my  body  very  weak  this  year, 
but  I bowl  and  play  cricket  much  for  strength.  I begin 
to  go  to  bed  at  eleven  p.  m.  I am  sorry  I spent  so 
many  money,  but  all’s  well.  You  are  an  old  man, 


178 


.THE  CHINESE 


father!  and  ought  sleep  in  earlying  and  rise  in  late. 
Drink  your  tea  stout  and  not  thin  now.  Try  amuse 
your  tedium  and  look  some  humorous.” 

One  laconic  diarist  entered  as  follows : “ This  day 

an  Englishman  came  to  the  school  and  gave  a disposal 
of  delivering  on  the  Southern  Sea.” 

A Yaumati  cook,  who  must  have  had  a preceptor 
cousin  employed  as  a lawyer’s  errand  boy  in  one  of 
those  brief-smelling  ofhces  up  one  flight  on  the  south 
side  of  Queen’s  Road  Central,  addressed  the  police  of 
the  Colony  across  the  bay  the  following  petition  to  search 
for  his  lost  brother : 

“ To  the  Generals  of  the  Charge  Room: 

“ The  humble  petition  of  Tam  Sing,  residing  at  the 
ground  floor.  Upper  Station  Street,  Yaumati,  sheweth: 
That  your  petitioner  can  not  find  out  his  brother,  who 
has  been  put  to  be  lost  after  his  being  abroad  from  the 
above  address  at  three  o’clock  afternoon,  Friday  last. 
His  name  is  Tam  Noo,  with  a flat  face,  sloping  eyes,  and 
common  size  and  height  as  to  his  body;  he  has  a yellow 
feature,  and  is  a man  belonging  to  the  Dong  On  district, 
and  his  dresses  are  all  black,  but  his  coat  was  made 
of  cloth,  with  brass  buttons.  His  feet  are  bare  without 
any  shoes  or  stockings.  And  your  petitioner  as  in  duty 
bound,  shall  ever  pray.” 

A native  draper’s  clerk  of  Shanghai,  as  a result  of 
his  visit  with  a package  to  be  delivered  to  a European 
hong,  where  he  had  seen  a calendar  which  attracted  his 
attention,  stormily  resurrected  his  mission  school  Eng- 
lish as  follows: 


CHINESE  HUMOR 


179 


“ Excellent  Sirs : 

“ The  Calendar  in  your  Company  is  glance  in  looking 
to  be  sure  surpassing  all  the  others ; and  also  it  is  gigantic 
beyond  example  in  connection  with  its  fine  spectacle, 
while  I look  at  it,  and  appreciate  pieces  for  oblige.” 

As  an  example  in  homiletic  English,  I offer  the  fol- 
lowing effort  of  a colporteur : “ Him  sorrying  his 

foolish,  and  having  ashamed  it,  he  was  forgave.” 

A friendly  Chinese  operator  in  the  Imperial  telegraph 
service  at  Kalgan,  thus  wrote  a missionary  during  the 
famous  Boxer  siege  of  Peking  in  June,  1900:  ‘‘We 

have  ordered  our  lineman  to  go  to  Peking  to  peep  the 
condition.  In  accounting  he  shall  come  back  in  a few 
days  when  must  have  a reliable  term  from  him.  With 
kind  regards  to  yourself  and  all  your  combinations.” 

Cheu  Fat,  a gourmand,  was  boasting  that  as  for  him, 
he  could  digest  anything,  even  to  the  wild,  oak-leaf 
silk  of  Chifu,  when  his  physician  Su  replied:  ‘‘The 
trouble  is,  a man  never  gets  a chance  to  digest  his  coffin 
cloth.” 

Huan  had  refused  to  join  the  local  Triad  Society  in 
organizing  opposition  to  an  unpopular  but  powerful 
magistrate.  He  thereupon  was  asked  for  his  reasons, 
and  replied  that  he  had  “ten.”  And  what  are  they? 
“ Two  wives  and  eight  children.” 

The  native  humor  for  that  prosperity  which  evidences 
itself  in  good  living  is  “ Blown  tight  as  a drum.”  The 
letters  make  a rather  pretty  monogram  to  look  at.  The 
artificers  in  silver  of  Yung  Yan  Lane,  Canton,  who 
make  belts  for  European  visitors,  sometimes  mix  a little 
humor  with  their  art  in  working  together  the  ideograms. 
They  are  now  being  exhibited  on  the  waists  of  many  of 


i8o 


THE  CHINESE 


the  primest  of  our  ladies,  who  imagine  that  they  are  dis- 
playing a pearl,  all  too  unknown,  of  Confucian  truth, 
which  emphasizes  again  the  wisdom  of  being  beautiful 
only  in  one’s  own  language,  especially  if  one  is  attending 
a five  o’clock  tea  at  the  Chinese  Ambassador’s. 

Shopkeepers  seldom  put  their  names  on  their  signs, 
but  announce  their  stores  by  a flowery  trade  mark. 
Some  of  the  lucky  legends  so  used  are : “ The  shop  of 

Heavenly  Peace,  dealing  in  collars  and  silks ; “ The  shop 
of  Emulating  the  Phoenix,  dealing  in  ivories  ” ; “ The 
shop  of  Extensive  Harmony,”  etc.  A white  man  gen- 
erally catches  the  pronunciation  of  Chinese  before  the 
meaning,  and  will  swear  to  you  that  the  Chinese  are  the 
most  affable  of  people,  for  did  not  every  employee  stop 
work  when  he  entered,  look  up,  and  follow  him  through 
the  shop  with  streaming  smiles.  The  reason  of  it  all 
was  because  Mr.  Reginald  Thusly,  “ Griffin,”  lately  from 
Eton,  but  now  Colonial  Cadet,  walked  into  the  collar 
shop  and  inquired  patronizingly,  “ if  Mr.  Extensive 
Harmony  was  in.” 

The  poetical  names  of  the  race  are  a constant  source 
of  amusement.  An  irate  mandarin  came  upon  our  mis- 
sionary, who  had  good  reason  for  never  taking  him 
seriously,  to  “ bluff  ” him  out  of  town,  and  announced 
his  name  as  “ Yuen  Chuen  i.  e..  Sweet  Spring. 

The  Peking  Gazette  of  August  i6th,  1906,  after  going 
at  length  into  the  charter  of  the  Canton-Han-kau  Rail- 
way, and  expatiating  on  the  latitude  of  the  franchise,  con- 
cluded with  this  reserved  admonition  to  the  directors: 
“ Think  honestly,  but  act  only  when  you  have  asked  us 
how.” 

The  Sin  Wan  Pao,  a native  paper,  referring  to  the 
signed  agreement  between  the  Wai  Wu  Pu,  and  the 


CHINESE  HUMOR 


i8i 


British  minister  concerning  the  Canton-Kowloon  Rail- 
way, states : “ In  addition,  the  viceroy  of  Canton  has 

been  instructed  to  see  that  the  governor  of  Hong-Kong 
understands  these  clauses  in  the  same  way  that  they  are 
understood  at  Peking,”  possibly  the  first  time  in  a legal 
document  that  the  text  may  be  amended  by  the  inter- 
pretation. 

Even  the  most  serious  man  in  all  human  history,  Con- 
fucius, was  once  known  to  bow  to  humor.  In  the  Chia 
Yu  (Family  Traditions)  classic,  the  Duke  Lu  asks  the 
Sage  if  any  act  was  more  shameful  than  a man  for- 
getting his  wife,  to  which  the  Sage  replied:  “ Yes,  when 
he  forgets  himself.” 

An  amusing  case  of  wits  saving  wind  occurred 
.•\ugust  24th,  1906,  on  Southbridge  Road,  Singapore, 
where  they  were  erecting  iron  standards  to  support  wires. 
A lunatic  butcher  with  a cleaver  was  rapidly  gaining  on  a 
Celestial,  whose  eyes  fired  up  with  a merry  twinkle  as  he 
skinned  up  the  pole  like  a monkey.  From  the  cross-arm 
the  gleeful  prey  very  easily  kicked  down  the  pursuer, 
until  the  exhausted  wretch  let  his  rage  froth  out  in  chop- 
ping fruitlessly  at  the  iron  pole. 

Puk  Luk  was  an  unemployed  coolie  of  Hong-Kong, 
who  had  a humor  to  toy  with  trouble  and  bon  mots.  He 
spied  another  coolie  on  the  walk,  sitting  on  a box  with 
his  back  to  the  street,  and  combing  out  the  feminine 
locks  of  his  queue.  Puk  took  to  the  outer  edge  and  in 
passing  the  tonsorial  coolie,  he  reached  out  and  pur- 
loined a brush.  Pursuit  was  given,  when  Puk  fled  to  a 
pile  of  laundry  baskets  and  hid  beneath  one.  When  the 
fokis  and  lukongs  were  overturning  them,  Puk  bit  their 
fingers.  Questioned  by  the  magistrate  why  he  acted  in 
this  manner,  in  addition  to  being  a thief,  he  said,  “ I was 


,THE  CHINESE 


182 

teaching  fool  fokis  to  turn  only  baskets  which  had 
smooth  edges.” 

Clans  dare  not  come  to  blows  in  the  British  Colony, 
and  therefore  they  ransack  their  heads  for  practical 
jokes.  A man  of  the  Ng  Clan  comes  to  Lok’s  stall  in 
the  Praya  market  and  orders  a dozen  fowls’  heads  to  be 
chopped  off.  When  it  is  done,  Ng  facetiously  says: 
“ Now  enter  that  on  my  account;  I thank  you  for  doing 
what  I told  you,”  and  scampers  for  the  street.  Lok  in- 
furiated immediately  pursues,  when  a confederate  Ng 
clansman  steals  what  he  can  from  the  pile.  When  Lok 
comes  back,  if  he  can  not  sell  the  remaining  chickens  at 
once  to  foreigners,  he  loses  them  too,  for  he  can  not 
afford  to  keep  ice.  If  Ng’s  family  are  rice  merchants, 
Lok  hires  a loft  for  a week  in  a godown  at  West  Point, 
immediately  under  Ng’s  rice  bins,  and  gets  to  work  with 
his  augur.  So  the  humorous  war  of  clan  spite  runs  its 
merry  round. 

The  wife  of  a military  man  of  Hong-Kong,  the 
glossiest  of  the  silk  in  her  dignified  dealings  with  Am- 
erican and  European  society,  had  occasion  to  hire  a new 
house  boy,  but  the  following  dialogue  explains  why  the 
applicant,  who  probably  had  sharpened  his  wits  in  the 
environs  of  Queen’s  College,  failed  to  get  the  place. 
What  is  your  name  ? “ Oh ! my  name  belong  Gao  Kung 

Loy.”  That  is  too  difficult  for  me  to  remember,  I will 
call  you  just  plain  John.  The  Chinese  asked,  “ What 
now  belong  your  name,  Missee?”  My  name  is  Mrs. 
Colonel  Errington.  The  suave  Celestial  who  may  yet 
lead  a retaliatory  army,  felt  up  his  sleeve,  and  drawing 
down  a smile,  in  a triumphant  long  lisp  drawled : 
“ Oh  ! Missee  Kulnel  Ellington  too  muchee  long  for  my; 
maskee,  I callee  you  plain  Tom.” 


CHINESE  HUMOR 


183 


I do  not  know  whether  the  following  incident  is  yellow 
or  white  humor.  The  consulate  had  a hurried  call  to 
match  Piccadilly  pom^wsitics  against  visiting  martial 
braid  at  the  landing  wharf.  The  silk  hat  needed 
smoothing  and  master  gave  his  orders.  The  house  boy 
was  a griffin  and  sought  the  aid  of  the  cook  coolie,  who 
stepped  into  the  breach  with  an  alacrity  which  later 
proved  to  be  heroic.  When  master’s  frock-coat  was 
brushed,  he  was  handed  a silk  hat,  well  daubed  with 
plumbago,  to  complete  the  amenities. 

The  manner  in  which  your  house  servant  appropriates 
your  rights  and  chattels  is  humorously  pervert.  He 
knows  that  your  knowledge  of  him,  his  land  and  his 
language,  is  compassed  by  two  dozen  words  of  Pidgin- 
English.  He  waves  his  occult  wand  in  a realm  apart 
and  watches  you  perform,  which  perhaps  explains  his 
everlasting  grin.  To  illustrate.  Mrs.  Colonel  Blank, 
very  English  and  lamentably  un-Colonial,  had  just  ar- 
rived and  with  that  suddenness  of  the  military  in  things 
social,  after  her  month  of  receiving  calls,  and  with  her 
effects  from  home  still  a month  away,  determined  to 
relieve  the  accumulation  of  obligations  and  ennui  by 
giving  a dinner  to  some  one  “ high  up,”  to  commence 
with.  It  should  be  something  pukka.  The  General 
Commanding  His  Majesty’s  Forces  in  China,  (how  the 
Chinese  resent  the  scope  of  the  title)  but  located  at 
Hong-Kong,  was  chosen  as  the  lion.  Going  to  her 
“ Number  One  boy,”  or  comprador,  she  said : “ Boy,  I 

give  dinner  this  night,  belly  finee  lady,  belly  finee  man, 
six  piecee;  splosem  you  clatch  everything  best  can  do; 
sabee  ”?  In  tlie  evening  the  Number  One  boy  called  his 
mistress  from  the  enlivened  company  which  was  drink- 
ing Scotch  and  Schweppe  appetizers  on  the  veranda. 


184 


THE  CHINESE 


and  announced  that  dinner  was  served.  The  Number 
Two  boy,  attired  in  a long  blue  tunic,  and  with  his  pig- 
tail tucked  in  his  waist  cord  so  as  not  to  whip  the  soup, 
swung  open  the  folding  doors.  Apprehensive,  the 
hostess  looked  upon  the  magic  scene ; cut  glass  and  silver 
galore,  an  expanse  of  occidental  and  oriental  richness. 
Upon  the  face  of  the  general’s  wife  hung  that  pain  which 
is  born  of  knowledge  suppressed  for  kindness’  Isake. 
When  she  could  be  excused  the  mistress  hastened  to  the 
head  servant.  “ Boy,  by  all  your  heathen  gods,  where 
you  catchee ; what  side ; what  fashion  ? ” “ Oh,”  said  the 

bland  one,  “ that  all  plopee  easy ; I sabee  flend  who  talkee 
how  his  piecee  master  go  out  topside  to  eat  chow  to- 
night; so  he  pay  (lend)  my  silver  dishee,  alee  samee  you 
talk  clatch  everything  best  can-  do.”  From  which  it 
appeared  that  the  general’s  boy  and  the  colonel’s  boy 
were  fast  and  reciprocating  friends;  the  former  had  ad- 
vised the  latter  that  his  master  was  going  out  to  dinner 
that  night,  which  gave  the  colonel’s  boy  the  opportunity 
of  his  life  to  ingratiate  himself  with  his  mistress  for  wit, 
and  to  make  his  master’s  apparent  wealth  the  wonder  of 
his  guests.  The  motive  either  sprang  from  pride,  or 
that  vast  well  of  humor  which  is  deeper  in  their  hearts 
than  we  Westerners  have  yet  plumbed.  Which  it  was, 
judge  ye,  as  you  know  them. 

A humane  mandarin  of  Sing  Yuen,  who  was  more 
of  a statesman  at  heart  than  a tax-gatherer,  when  asked 
by  his  viceroy  why  he  did  not  “ comb  ” his  district 
finer,  replied : “ We  should  make  soup  of  the  eggs,  and 

not  of  the  hen.” 

The  Chinese  petty  thief  greases  his  pig  tail  and  also 
his  bare  shining  shoulders,  so  that  he  may  be  as  hard  to 
grasp  as  a jellyfish.  A bland-looking,  furtive-mannered 


CHINESE  HUMOR 


185 


individual,  with  a resemblance  to  a native  who  was  once 
deported,  promenading  in  Hong-Kong  with  a finely 
oiled  queue,  is  enough  for  the  wary  Sikh  police.  The 
smile  is  at  once  transferred  from  the  Mongol  to  the 
Hindoo  face,  as  the  suspect  is  led  by  the  slack  of  the 
knickerbockers  to  headquarters  up  Wyndham  Hill,  to 
explain  why  one  so  poor  should  be  so  extravagant  in 
pomades.  ♦ 

The  southern  Chinese  recite  this  proverb : “ Why  is 

a pig  fat?  So  that  he  can  not  travel  far  from  his  mud 
and  learn  that  he  is  a pig.  It  would  never  do  for  him 
to  go  to  Tientsin  and  see  larks.  He  would  then  not  even 
be  willing  to  be  a thin  pig.” 

The  Hakka  herders  of  Kowloon  have  this  witticism 
on  stubbornness : “ The  proper  way  to  drive  a pig  is 

the  opposite  way.” 


V 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE 

Despite  the  reiterated  epithets  that  she  is  the  Eternal, 
Imperturbable  and  Impenetrable,  during  the  last  five 
years  China  has  made  more  comparative  progress  than 
any  nation,  and  to  her  will  belong  the  twentieth  century, 
as  the  nineteenth  was  distinctive  for  the  development  of 
North  America. 

Japan,  and  the  model  colonies  of  Manila  and  Hong- 
Kong,  have  not  alone  influenced  China’s  politics  in  these 
latter  days.  We  may  understand  somewhat  the  politi- 
cal lethargy  of  the  Chinese  in  the  past  if  we  frequently 
call  to  mind  that  they  seldom  contemplated  their  country 
as  China  (the  pure  country  of  the  Tsins  who  built  the 
Great  Wall),  but  as  Chung  Kwok,  or  the  Central  King- 
dom, which  could  not,  from  its  position,  but  be  an  ex- 
ample to  the  whole  world.  Out  of  vast  indifference  to 
and  ignorance  of  travel,  of  course  grew  this  colossal  and 
stultifying  political  pride.  One  of  the  central  provinces, 
Hunan,  first  gtive  itself  the  name,  until  the  whole  people 
have  long  learned  to  use  it  in  the  belief  that  their  nation 
occupied  the  earth’s  center,  and  was  accordingly  the 
most  important  and  self-sustaining,  which  latter  as- 
sumption was  perhaps  justified.  What  we  call  Thibet, 
the  residents  thereof  call  Bod.  Next  to  themselves,  the 
Chinese  ranked  the  Nui  Fan,  or  internal  foreigners,  as 
the  old  tribute-paying  tribes  of  Szechuen  were  called. 

186 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  187 


In  order,  follows  the  Wai  Fan,  external  foreigners,  or 
wandering  tribes  of  Mongolia;  the  Nui  I,  or  internal 
barbarians,  like  the  aboriginal  mountaineers  of  Hainan 
Island;  and  the  Wai  I,  or  external  barbarians  like  our- 
selves and  other  irredeemable  strangers.  Their  distin- 
guishing word  for  Englishmen  is  Hung  Mao,  men 
with  red  beards;  for  Americans,  Hwa  Ki,  men  of  the 
Flowery  Flag;  for  Portuguese,  who  were  the  first  Euro- 
peans they  met.  Si  Yang,  men  of  the  western  ocean; 
and  for  Japanese,  Wu  Jin,  dwarfs.  Merely  their 
locality  or  appearance,  and  not  their  intellect  or  history, 
in  the  foreigner,  appealed  therefore  to  the  self-satisfied 
Chinese  of  olden  days.  But  things  have  changed. 

M’hen  we  say  that  they  have  been  influenced,  we  do 
not  mean  to  convey  the  impression  that  the  Chinese  to- 
day are  astounded  at  the  achievements  of  the  Japanese, 
for  they  consider  that  Japan  lacks  that  essential  of  per- 
manent greatness,  population.  Numbers  have  always 
impressed  the  Mongol,  who  learned  with  respect  from 
the  missionary  Buddhists  in  ancient  times  of  another 
great  people  numerically,  the  Hindoos,  and  forthwith 
showed  them  honor  by  giving  their  religion  a place  at 
the  altar. 

That  it  should  be  possible  in  recent  times  that  the 
great  hordes  in  Russia  should  experience  a political  up- 
heaval, has  induced  the  discontented  and  ambitious 
among  the  Chinese,  in  their  organization  of  the  patriotic 
Young-China  party,  to  bestir  themselves  from  despair 
and  torpidity,  in  the  hope  that  they  too  may  have  a 
government  which  will  be  more  intimately  in  touch  with 
the  desires  of  the  common  people,  and  achieve  that 
worthy  aim  of  diplomacy:  to  be  valued  as  a friend  and 
‘feared  as  a foe.  The  Parliamentary  Commission,  sent 


THE  CHINESE 


1 88 

to  Europe  and  America  in  1906,  reported  that  they  were 
most  impressed  with  Japan’s  constitution,  and  after  that 
with  France’s,  as  the  Japanese,  when  in  a similar  embryo 
state,  modeled  their  constitution  after  Germany’s,  but  the 
report  of  a Manchu  Commission  is  far  from  being  the 
opinion  of  leaders  like  Kang  Yu  Wei,  who  look  to  Amer- 
ica as  a model.  Trained  in  obedience  to  his  father  dur- 
ing a whole  life  time,  as  was  the  Roman  under  the 
Republic,  the  Chinese  by  character  offers  a steady  founda- 
tion for  the  responsibilities  of  representative  rule.  The 
Commission  suggested  that  a trial  of  provincial  elective 
parliaments  should  be  instituted  by  1910;  these  parlia- 
ments to  choose  a provincial  executive,  who  shall  be 
subordinate  to  the  viceroy  now  named  by  the  Emperor. 
The  Progressives,  who  are  asking  for  more  independence 
than  this,  promise  that  they  will  soon  turn  to  contempt 
Curzon’s  prophecy  of  twelve  years  ago  concerning  their 
race:  “ Sedet  ccternumque  sedcbit.” 

China  has  been  easy  thus  far  to  govern  because  she 
has  been  an  agricultural  people,  and  not  a manufacturing 
or  urban  one.  She  has  no  cities  the  size  of  ours.  The 
Clan  life  which  they  love,  and  which  has  given  the  na- 
tion its  peculiar  strength,  never  could  have  survived  if 
its  vitality  had  depended  on  an  urban  organization. 

Nowadays  one  often  hears  the  ancient  prophecy  re- 
peated : “ When  yellow  snow  falls  in  Peking,  the  dy- 

nasty will  end.”  Such  a phenomenon  occurred  shortly 
before  the  fall  of  the  Ming  dynasty.  China  is  coming 
to  the  judgment.  If  the  Manchu  successor  of  that 
famous  conquering  “ General  of  the  Eight  banners,”  of 
three  centuries  ago,  can  not  rise  to  the  emergency  and 
adjust  himself,  as  he  did  in  Kang  He’s  progressive 
reign,  he  must  retire,  but  it  is  not  certain  that  he  will 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  189 


miss  his  opportunity  of  rendering  better  service  any 
more  than  the  Samurai  in  Japan  neglected  his,  always 
remembering  that  in  the  fall  of  rulers,  history  records 
incapacity  as  great  a fault  as  injustice.  Peking  is  now 
divided  between  the  Moderate  and  Conservative  parties; 
there  is  really  no  advanced  section,  as  there  was  after 
China’s  war  with  Japan,  and  what  remains  of  the  last 
named  party  is  at  Canton.  It  continues  to  send  delega- 
tions to  Peking,  asking  for  an  immediate  constitution. 
Upper  and  Lower  Houses  of  a Diet;  juries;  freedom  of 
speech  and  press;  the  spread  of  schools,  factories  and 
foreign  books;  pardon  of  political  exiles;  a sane  criminal 
code ; an  advanced  railway,  foreign  and  maritime  policy ; 
the  widening  of  secret  society  and  guild  walls  into 
those  of  political  parties;  etc.  How  every  one  dares  to 
laugh  now  at  the  old  edict  pasted  up  in  the  tea-houses 
“Mo  Tan  Kvo  shih”;  “Don’t  talk  politics.  By  order.” 
Of  course  rule  by  delegation  is  not  perfection  in  the 
respect  that  government  should  be  exercised  by  the 
people,  but  if  the  Manchu  improves  in  his  rule  as  the  men 
of  Satsuma  have,  something  will  be  gained.  When  the 
Chinese  criticizes  the  airs  of  his  Manchu  ruler,  his  idiom 
is : “ He  wears  his  hat  on  one  side.”  It  was  the  Manchu, 
and  not  the  native  Ming  dynasty,  which  taught  the 
Chinese  the  doctrine  of  the  exclusion  of  foreigners. 
The  Manchu  has  made  some  concessions  to  Chinese 
criticism.  Last  year  the  ancient  ban  against  mixed 
Manchu  and  Chinese  marriages  was  removed  and  this 
year  saw  the  last  of  the  Manchu  generals  withdrawn 
from  the  provinces,  thus  leaving  the  Civil  Viceroy,  who 
is  often  a Chinese,  free.  Is  it  prophetical  that  the 
Manchu  has  not  called  his  legal  city  the  capital  of  the 
land,  but  only  the  capital  (Ching)  of  the  north  (Pei)  ? 


190 


THE  CHINESE 


Peking  is  really  a poor  location  for  a capital,  as  it  is 
removed  from  the  center  of  population.  On  this  ac- 
count, Yunnan  Province  has  never  really  been  governed 
from  Peking.  The  old  capital  of  the  Mings,  Nanking 
(literally.  Capital  of  the  South)  was  a much  better  loca- 
tion, and  Han-kau  would  be  better  still.  Now  that  rail- 
ways are  opening  up  the  land,  there  is  no  reason  why  the 
capital  should  not  be  at  Choong  King,  or  Ching  Too  in 
Szechuen.  It  would  be  the  center  of  population  and 
bind  Yunnan  and  Thibet  and  the  greatest  and  most  am- 
bitious of  them  all,  Kwangtung,  closer  to  the  throne. 
There  are  precedents  for  something  apparently  so  radical, 
for  we  must  remember  that  in  so-called  changeless  China, 
there  have  been  thirteen  changes  of  capital. 

There  are  only  five  million  Manchus  among  the  four 
hundred  million  Chinese.  Even  in  Manchuria,  the  Man- 
chus who  cut  only  enough  cedar  and  arbor-vitse  wood  to 
warm  them,  and  fish  and  hunt  only  what  will  barely  feed 
them,  when  their  pension  is  spent,  are  dying  off,  and 
thrifty  Chinese  emigration  from  Shantung  is  filling  the 
land,  which  is  revenge  enough  for  the  capturing  of 
Peking  in  1644  by  the  Manchu  Dor  Gun.  In  the  same 
way  the  Chinese  are  peacefully  conquering  Mongolia  by 
squatting  on  the  lands  of  the  roving  Tartars,  who  are 
pushed  farther  into  arid  Gobi,  or  compelled  to  sober  up 
and  settle  down  among  the  new  tillers  of  the  soil. 

Much  has  been  made  abroad  of  the  Wei,  the  “ squeeze 
pidgin,”  or  peculation  of  the  Manchu  officials,  who  are 
scattered  throughout  the  empire.  The  Mongolian,  who 
has  suffered  more  from  them,  does  not  say  “ he  has 
squeezed  me,”  but  “ he  has  eaten  me.”  In  the  first  place, 
it  must  be  observed  that  this  is  not  a charge  against  the 
great  Chinese  people.  It  will  be  found,  as  it  is  among 


CO^VHKiHT.  BV  UNO£»m^OU  *.  UMI&KnObO,  N. 

China's  best-known  statesman,  Li  Hung  Chang,  in  his  \’ice-royal 
\ amen  at  Tientsin,  September,  1900. 


In  Hung  Chang,  with  the  American  General  ^^■ard.  and  the  British 
(icneral  Gordon,  saved  the  Manchu  throne  in  the  dangerous 
1 ae-ping  rebellion  of  the  Southern  provinces  in  186^. 

From  that  year  until  1901  he  was  the  late  Empress 
Dowager's  right-hand  statesman  in  her  deal- 
ings with  foreigners,  and  the  internal 
reforms  which  the  trend  of  the  times 
forced  her  to  adopt. 


COC>TRlQMr,  t'T  UNOERWOOO  A UN6tM«O0D,  N T. 


Marching  Home ! Gallant  6th  U.  S.  Cavalry  after  brilliant  relief 
of  Peking,  North  China,  siege  of  1900.  The  allies  admitted 
that  the  Americans  were  the  best  marksmen  and 
brainiest  open-order  fighters  in  the  allied 
armies.  This  is  the  first  time  fine 
cavalry  horses  were  seen  in  China. 


C0»VA>4HT.  iv  UHOI«*OOQ  A " »• 

American  section  of  captured  wall  of  Tien-tsin,  North  ( hina,  siege 
of  1900.  Soldier  of  14th  Ik  S.  Infantry  on  guard. 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  191 


otlier  people,  that  small  salaries  for  large  responsibilities 
led  to  this  obnoxious  practice,  which  came  in  with  Man- 
chu  rule.  I'or  instance,  the  governor-general  of  Mon- 
golia receives  on  the  pay-roll  five  thousand  dollars,  and 
the  residents  of  such  centers  as  Koren  and  Kashgar  aver- 
age only  eighteen  hundred  dollars,  while  the  greatest  ef- 
fectiveness is  expected  of  them  in  diplomacy.  Sir  Robert 
Bredon,  their  foreign  director  of  the  imperial  customs, 
receives  only  twenty-five  thousand  dollars  salary.  When, 
through  systematization  of  collection,  China’s  revenue 
is  greater,  as  it  is  becoming,  “ squeeze  ” will  die  out,  as 
no  race, — ruled  or  rulers, — are  more  inclined  to  be  hon- 
est. They  have  never  had  parties,  with  a rotation  of 

I plunder,  in  China.  The  Chinese  Triads  differ  from  the 
Japanese  Samurai  in  this,  that  they  do  not  believe  liberty 
will  be  a gift  from  a superior  class,  as  the  Japanese  nobles 

Iendow'ed  the  clans  with  a partial  constitution.  This  was 
the  only  time  in  the  world’s  history  when  political  rights 
were  so  established,  and  they  do  not  think  it  has  proved 
t satisfactory.  They  believe  they  will  have  to  win  from 
■ the  higher  powers  their  liberty  in  the  good  old  Anglo- 
' Saxon  way,  by  argument  all  the  time  and  arms  part  of 
I the  time.  Reform  really  began  at  the  close  of  the  China- 
! Japan  war.  Now  that  the  obstructionist  Dowager  Em- 
' press  Tse  Hsi  is  gathered  to  her  ghostly  traditions,  doubt- 
I less  the  Cantonese  Kang  Yu  Wei  will  return,  and  the 
I brilliant  Yuan  Shi  K’ai  of  Pechili,  stubborn  Shum  from 
I the  south;  tried  and  solid  old  Chang  from  the  central 
I provinces;  the  Columbia  College  bred  Tang  Shao  Yi; 

I Viceroy  Tuan  Fang,  the  IManchu  who,  in  Shensi,  saved 

the  Christians  in  1900;  the  Yale  graduate  Liang  Tun 
Yen;  the  Cambridge  graduate  Shen  Tun  Ho,  and  their 
like,  will  gather  around  the  new  Regent  for  the  renewal 


THE  CHINESE 


192 

of  the  militant  and  reform  plans  so  suddenly  and  dis- 
astrously dropped  in  1897. 

Who  are  the  men  of  the  hour  in  China,  on  whom 
Americans  should  keep  their  eyes?  Who  are  the  strong 
characters,  a study  of  whose  modern  personality  will 
make  China  far  more  interesting  to  us  henceforward? 

First,  because  he  held  high  offices,  let  us  mention  Yuan 
Shi  K’ai,  lately  deposed  by  the  new  Regent  from  his 
viceroy  and  chancellorships.  Yuan  is  the  best  equipped, 
most  practical,  most  modern,  and  most  popular  with  the 
foreigners  in  Peking,  of  all  Chinese  statesmen.  He  is 
the  organizer  of  China’s  modern  army  of  the  north. 
He  succeeded  in  what  his  predecessor  Li  Hung  Chang 
tried  to  do,  in  establishing  mills,  mines  and  railways  in 
the  north.  He  is  the  best  financier  in  China,  and  a be- 
liever that  honesty  is  the  most  economical  fiscal  policy, 
when  you  come  to  borrow  again  or  refund  loans.  Con- 
trary to  the  Empress  Dowager’s  orders,  he  saved  the 
Christians  from  the  Boxers  when  he  was  viceroy  of 
Pechili  Province,  but  there  is  always  some  flaw  in  the 
jewel.  By  his  betrayal  of  reform  in  1897  he  made  Box- 
erism  possible.  While  till  lately  he  was  high  in  the 
Manchu  councils  and  offices,  he  is  a native  Chinese  by 
blood.  He  was  dismissed  by  the  Regent,  Prince  Chun, 
in  1909  on  the  excuse  that  he  had  disastrously  relapsed 
once  from  reform  and  betrayed  the  extensive  modern 
plans  of  the  late  Emperor  Kwang  Su  to  the  inexpressible 
Dowager  Empress,  thus  bringing  on  the  reactionary  coup 
d’etat  of  1898,  which  postponed  reform  for  ten  years. 
He  may  be  restored  if  Manchu  jealousies  cease  to  attack 
Chinese  officials,  and  one  hope  of  his  return  lies  in  the 
fact  that  he  had  an  eye  for  choosing  the  most  capable 
subordinates  available.  These  men  are  a powerful  col- 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  193 


lege,  devoted  to  his  personal  cause.  He  is  a conservative 
rather  than  a radical  reformer.  He  believes  in  the  power 
of  the  press,  and  is  not  averse  to  bribing  it.  He  is  ex- 
tremely unpopular  with  Kang  Yu  Wei,  also  a native 
Chinese,  their  greatest  and  most  radical  reformer,  the 
Roosevelt  of  China,  who  is  now  in  exile  in  hot  Penang 
Straits  Settlements,  under  the  protection  of  Britain. 

Who  is  this  Kang,  who,  like  Roosevelt,  shows  his  teeth 
as  he  eagerly  prepares  to  attack  his  opponent  with  a 
spring,  back  of  which  is  the  whole  incorruptible  soul  of 
a leader  whose  impetus  is  as  weighty  as  that  of  a host? 
He  is  the  New  China, — has  been  it  since  1897,  and  it 
was  the  example  of  British  organization  at  Hong-Kong 
which  inspired  him  who  came  out  of  Canton  near-by. 
Had  he  started  north  overland  with  another  army  of 
Taepings,  he  would  have  won  the  throne  and  held  it. 
No,  he  rather  chose  education  and  sought  the  Emperor 
for  a pupil.  He  is  hated  by  the  old  conservative  Man- 
chus,  and  even  the  literati  of  the  disbanded  Tsung  Li 
Yamen  (Foreign  Office)  of  Peking,  who  are  as  skilful 
and  unprincipled  “ disappearance  artists  ” as  a doge’s 
cabal,  or  the  private  metropolitan  detective  agencies,  fed 
by  corrupt  millions,  which  have  grown  up  in  some  of  our 
western  civilizations.  He  was  joint  author  with  the 
Emperor  Kwang  Su  of  the  shower  of  reform  edicts  of 
1897,  on  which  China’s  hopes  of  modernity  to-day  rest. 
His  name  spreads  like  the  spirit  of  an  informing  angel 
over  the  whole  of  China,  and  every  new  official,  especially 
those  educated  in  America,  who  has  seen  a light,  goes 
sometime  to  the  Oracle  Kang  to  feed  it  with  oil. 

Perhaps  the  Fates  have  ordained  it  that  he  shall  keep 
his  light  pure,  and  never  trade  in  the  spoils  of  office, 
thus  the  better  to  inspire  those  who  must  soil  their  hands 


194 


THE  CHINESE 


in  active  politics,  pure  as  the  intent  of  the  best  may  be. 
But  he  chafes  at  this,  for  he  is  many  sided.  He  wants 
to  be  as  active  as  Yuan,  who  adopted  his  ideas  and  be- 
trayed them  once  for  office,  though  Yuan,  from  1898  to 
1908,  returned  to  moderate  reform,  and  steady,  conserva- 
tive progress.  In  America,  of  course,  such  spirits  as 
Kang  could  not  be  side-tracked  by  intrigue,  and  that 
more  than  anything  proves  the  balance  of  our  constitu- 
tion and  institutions.  In  China  it  is  yet  possible,  and 
even  Yuan  has  at  last  suffered  by  it.  Kang  is  not  an 
ultra  reformer.  He  proposes  to  absorb  the  Manchu  and 
not  to  eradicate  him.  He  speaks  well  of  the  late  Kwang 
Su’s  powers,  and  he  hates  the  memory  of  the  late  Dow- 
ager, in  which  we  agree  with  him.  Kang  is  more  senti- 
mental, sensitive  and  versatile  than  any  Chinese  leader. 
The  very  dangers  of  poison  and  dagger  that  beset  him; 
the  necessity  for  a circle  of  iron  to  guard  him,  show  best 
the  need  of  our  sympathy  with  these  men  who  propose 
strongly  to  attack  the  old  political  literati  of  China  in  their 
ancient  privileges  and  prejudices.  Kang’s  power  from 
his  remote  retreat  is  shown  in  the  disgrace  of  even  so 
august  an  official  as  Yuan.  Kang’s  name  is  the  one  most 
spoken  by  all  Chinese  within  foreign  borders,  and 
it  is  these  returning  Chinese  who  leaven  their  country’s 
institutions,  and  every  American  who  can  should  take 
a Chinese  student  to  his  bosom  and  impress,  ere  he  de- 
parts for  home,  the  vitalizing  spirit  of  liberty.  They  will 
never  forget,  for,  after  all,  they  are  as  capable  of  great 
enthusiasms  as  they  are  of  undying  forbearance,  which, 
till  now,  has  been  their  distinguishing  characteristic. 

There  is  also  Sun  Yat  Sen,  a neighbor  in  exile  at 
Penang.  Pie  would  go  straight  to  the  core  of  the  trouble 
with  the  sword.  He  is  a reformer,  of  course,  but  called 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  195 


a revolutionist  because  he  does  not  know  whom  besides 
himself  he  would  enthrone  after  the  leader  had  won  the 
cause.  He  likes  republics.  Unlike  Kang,  he  would  oust 
the  Manchu.  He  is  one  of  our  men  of  mark,  because  he 
represents  the  eventual  force  which  will  come  into  play 
if  China  does  not  reform,  and  he  deserves  respect  for  his 
sincerity.  His  influence  is  potent.  He  has  no  Boxer 
spirit,  for  he  appreciates  the  foreigner,  but  seat  him  in 
power  and  he  could  be  an  uncompromising  Boxer,  for 
he  is  exceedingly  patriotic,  and  lives  within  far  narrower 
mental  lines  than  Kang. 

Liang  Chi  Choa  is  the  writer  of  the  reform  party,  also 
at  Penang  in  exile,  who  selects  leavening  foreign  books 
and  fills  China,  notwithstanding  the  frantic  Censor  Pu 
(Board),  with  their  translations  and  his  applications  of 
them.  He  would  make  a splendid  secretary  of  state  if 
China  ever  became  a republic.  We  have  no  idea  what 
an  imperium  ex  imperio  this  company  at  Penang  is  in 
influencing  the  aspirations  and  opinions  of  the  younger 
officials  throughout  the  empire. 

Wu  Ting  Fang,  so  well  known  to  Americans,  by  right 
should  claim  the  longest  review.  He  assuaged  our  fears 
in  the  anxious  days  of  the  Peking  siege,  for  he  alone, 
for  two  excruciating  months,  in  all  the  world  knew  that 
our  legations  were  safe.  How  he  knew  he  will  never 
tell,  and  I would  not  steal  the  secret  from  his  code  if 
I could.  He  is  the  redoubtable,  the  learned  and  the  true. 
What  he  has  done  for  scientific,  civic  and  legal  reform  in 
China,  at  great  personal  danger  to  himself,  can  hardly 
be  recounted.  He  is  as  well  known  at  Hong-Kong  as 
at  Peking  and  Washington.  He  is  no  leader  of  arms 
or  politics;  he  is  a quiet  deep  molder  of  methods,  perfect 
in  his  judgment,  a chancellor  facile  princeps.  Watch 


196 


THE  CHINESE 


him  as  he  works  from  year  to  year  for  Chinese  and 
American  progress  and  approximation,  as  well  balanced 
as  a Waltham  wheel.  We  are  rather  discussing  strong 
men  at  their  mighty  work,  and  it  is  therefore  a light 
thing,  perhaps,  to  add  that  Wu  is  also  the  Chesterfield  of 
China  in  all  the  graces  of  speech  and  manners. 

The  Regent  Chun  of  the  royal  blood  of  longest  reign 
of  all  the  world’s  thrones,  belongs  to  this  new  set,  which 
is  in  the  ascendant.  He  is  a Manchu,  of  course.  I have 
seen  him  face  to  face  at  Hong-Kong  and  studied  him. 
He  obeyed  Kang  and  took  revenge  on  Yuan  for  betraying 
the  plans  of  1897.  The  Regent  is  the  pivot  on  which  all 
now  turns.  He  has  the  opportunity  of  the  Chinese  ages, 
a John  the  Baptist  to  usher  in  the  new  era.  He  is  the 
youngest  of  the  leaders,  the  unfortunate  perpetuation  of 
the  Chinese  system  of  the  last  fifty  years  of  having  an 
infant  as  titular  ruler  and  a spokesman  in  its  place.  It 
is  a bad  system,  growing  out  of  the  greed  of  politicians, 
but  it  is  not  Chun’s  fault.  He  loved  his  brother  Kwang 
Su,  and  no  doubt  sympathizes  with  his  reform  plans, 
which  he  is  now  putting  in  force.  He  is  to  be  pardoned 
somewhat  if  he  should  yield  now  and  then  to  the  bitter 
attack  of  the  reactionaries.  He  is  to  be  pitied,  for  at- 
tack him  they  will,  and  a long  list  of  greater  than  he 
have  fallen,  jeven  the  mighty  Kang  himself.  But  reform 
is  here,  and  he  is  with  it, — reform  both  in  Manchu  and 
Chinese  circles. 

There  remains  at  Peking  Prince  Ching,  an  uncle  of  the 
Regent,  the  old  Manchu  watch-dog  who  has  been  the 
power  behind  three  Manchu  thrones.  I do  not  mean  to 
say  that  he  displaced  the  Dowager  in  late  years,  but  his 
growl  was  often  heard.  He  has  not  a modern  education, 
but  if  sanity,  strength  and  steadiness  count  in  reform. 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  197 


Ching  is  still  to  be  reckoned  with,  and  his  old  force  will 
make  itself  felt.  He  does  not  want  a fool  China  any 
more  than  the  reformers  do.  It  was  Ching  who  ad- 
vocated sending  Chinese  girls  abroad  to  study,  and  bring- 
ing foreign  governesses  into  China.  This  is  the  most 
surprising  reconjmendation  that  has  been  offered  at 
Peking. 

Then  there  is  dear  old  Chang  Chih  Tung,  who  never 
betrayed  a foreign  friend,  but  who  is  by  no  means  a 
sycophant  of  the  white  man.  He  is  now  a reformer,  for 
he  has  always  been  one.  Let  him  tell  you  at  the  outset 
that  he  will  never  consent  to  a jot  of  reform  in  Chinese 
classics  or  religion,  and  you  will  trust  his  honesty  for  ever 
and  grant  his  demand.  Yea,  he  has  written  a funny  book 
on  the  subject.  It  is  funny  because  it  is  unnecessary. 
But  he  will  follow  you  nearly  anywhere  else.  He  was 
building  mills,  arsenals,  opening  mines,  running  railways 
and  ships,  while  Kang  was  still  at  his  books.  He  has  a 
modern  army  second  only  to  Yuan’s  in  efficiency  at  the 
targets  and  in  manoeuvers.  He  knocks  hard  at  our  tariff 
wall,  and  says,  “ Take  it  down  a little  lower  and  I will  put 
my  Han-kau  iron  in.”  He  has  already  landed  two  car- 
goes of  pig  at  Brooklyn,  and  is  every  week  landing 
cargoes  at  Japanese  ports.  He  makes  all  the  rails  for 
his  own  railways,  and  he  has  more  railways  in  operation 
than  there  are  in  the  whole  empire  of  Japan.  In  in- 
dustrial organization,  he  is  the  J.  Pierpont  Morgan  of 
China,  but  he  gives  his  fortune  back  to  the  State,  and 
doesn’t  own  a review,  pulpit  or  newspaper  to  tell  about 
it.  Your  interview  ended,  he  will  call  you  back  again 
and  emphasize ; “ Remember,  put  me  down  for  no  reform 
in  classics  or  religion.”  What  can  you  do  with  a man 
like  this  but  grant  him  all  he  asks  and  love  him,  though 


198 


THE  CHINESE 


you  lose  all  your  sacred  ambitions  for  western  mission- 
aries and  books.  Chang  won’t  read  a line  Liang  Chi 
writes,  but  he  has  been  doing  for  years  exactly  what 
Liang,  you  and  I have  been  recommending  in  what  we 
have  written.  “ An  old  fogy,”  is  he  ? rather  the  “ Grand 
Old  Man  ” of  China,  marching  steadily  with  the  youngest 
and  carrying  the  largest  knapsack  of  deeds  done. 

These  are  the  representative  leaders  of  China  to-day, 
and  they  are  as  diverse  as  our  own  leaders  in  the  talents 
which  have  been  committed  to  them,  but  underlying  their 
characters,  with  one  exception,  are  the  world-wide  es- 
sentials of  courage,  singleness  of  purpose,  devotion  to 
country,  unselfishness,  and  hate  of  graft,  which  is  the 
prevailing  tendency  of  our  age,  as  absolute  as  it  is  hated 
by  the  God  of  all  men,  yellow  or  white. 

You  will  notice  that  the  Manchu  has  been  diligent  in 
one  thing,  to  place  his  Uigur  character,  of  corkscrew  ap- 
pearance like  the  Syrian,  opposite  the  Chinese  character 
on  the  copper  coin,  but  this  is  the  whole  of  his  literary 
conquest,  for  even  the  Manchu  officials,  scattered  through- 
out the  Kingdom,  are  devoted  to  the  Chinese  literature 
and  language.  Over  the  East  Gate  of  Mukden,  in  a 
large  plain  tympanum,  a Confucian  motto  has  been  cut 
in  Chinese  and  Manchu  characters.  However,  other  con- 
siderations have  now  a certain  bearing  there.  Around 
the  Black  Stone  of  Mukden,  which  the  Manchus  consider 
the  center  of  the  earth,  circles  a new  influence, — that  of 
the  Japanese.  Whether  this  will  drive  the  Manchus  into 
the  arms  of  the  Chinese,  as  the  loss  of  Hanover  endeared 
the  Guelph  house  to  the  British,  remains  to  be  seen. 

There  is  no  caste  question  to  fetter  the  race,  as  India 
has  been  retarded  and  disrupted,  and  if  China  is  only 
now  approaching  a constitutional  government,  she  has 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  199 


long  been  preparing  for  it  by  the  most  wonderful  dem- 
ocracy of  letters  which  the  world  has  ever  known.  The 
old  divisions  of  society  fall  into  Scholars,  Farmers.  Ar- 
tisans, Merchants;  the  Soldier  and  the  Priest  having  no 
standing,  and  being  called  the  “ Trouble  Makers.”  The 
new  divisions  are  to  be,  Literature,  Politics,  Trade, — 
which  is  probably  one  more  division  than  we  have  in  our 
own. 

An  emigration  of  one  million  a year  is  rapidly  filling 
up  Malay,  Borneo,  Java,  Siam  and  Burmah  with  Chinese, 
and  sealing  them  in  bonds  of  blood,  literature  and  com- 
merce, to  the  home  land.  As  compradors,  bankers,  mer- 
chants and  laborers,  they  are  spreading  over  the  whole 
Orient,  just  as  the  Roman  did  from  the  Pyrenees  to  the 
Euphrates,  and  theirs  is  none  the  less  a conquest,  though 
it  is  peaceful.  But  whether  or  not  the  Home  Rule 
“ Ming  ” flag  that  last  floated  over  the  moat  of  Nanking 
flutters  free  again,  the  spirits  of  Flung  Woo  and  Hung 
Tsin  are  marching  on  with  the  progress  of  the  Chinese 
race.  Only  may  it  be  that  the  feet  of  nationalism  in  her 
frenzy  may  not  be  directed  in  bloodshed  against  the  Si 
Fan,  or  white  foreigner.  This  is  our  prayer,  but  we 
must  expect  some  disappointments  as  progress  develops 
her  ups  and  downs.  Shall  we  take  seriously  the  rapid 
development  of  the  “ Restorer  of  Rights  ” party,  and' 
articles  such  as  the  following  w'ritten  by  a student  in  the 
Flang  Chan  Pehoa  Pao,  or  Courier:  “O!  White 
Faces  and  red-bristled  barbarians,  when  we  of  the 
Flowery  Land  shall  march  forth  to  war,  then  shall  you 
be  brayed  even  as  are  drugs  in  a mortar  ? ” The  East  has 
always  been  like  its  Thibetan  glaciers;  when  any  move- 
ment warms  it,  it  moves  in  a mass,  and  therein  has  been 
its  danger  to  opponents  since  the  time  of  Kublai  Khan. 


200 


THE  CHINESE 


We  recall  the  following  manifesto,  written  during  the 
Opium  War  with  England : “ There  is  that  English 

nation,  whose  ruler  is  as  often  a woman  as  a man,  and 
which  devours  Southern  peoples,  first  peeling  the  fat  off 
their  estates.  Their  island  is  a petty  one;  they  trust  en- 
tirely to  wooden  dragons  (ships).  Could  we  reach  them, 
we  should  hurl  them  over  as  the  blast  does  the  thin  bam- 
boo. If  we  let  them  settle  on  the  Pearl  (Canton  River) 
it  will  be  like  opening  the  door  and  bowing  in  Mr.  Wolf! 
In  the  hour  of  our  patriotism,  even  our  wives  and  daugh- 
ters, finical  and  delicate  as  jewels,  have  learned  to  dis- 
course of  arms.  The  high  gods  clearly  behold;  fight  till 
the  golden  pool  is  fully  restored  to  honorable  peace.” 
Poll  Toun  Kiao  Li  (one  religion  or  another,  we  Chinese 
are  all  brothers)  say  they,  when  they  think  of  those  who 
criticize  or  challenge  them. 

This  stolid  but  revengeful  enough  race  has  been  stung 
until  they  have  struck,  and  may  strike  again  at  all  foreign 
domination,  whether  Manchu,  Macaense,  Mikado  or  Mis- 
sionary, in  their  striving  after  the  extinction  of  what, 
since  the  viceroy  of  Che-kiang  drove  the  Portuguese 
out  of  Ningpo  in  1542,  they  have  considered  their  great- 
est humiliation,  viz. : the  sacrilege  of  foreign  colonies  on 
the  mainland  of  their  sacred  country  — Kiao-chou  held 
by  Germany ; Shanghai  by  triple  occupation ; Kowloon  by 
Britain;  Macao  by  Portugal;  Port  Arthur  by  Japan,  and 
Kwang  Chow  by  France.  This  feeling  particularly  mani- 
fests itself  at  present  over  the  decisions  of  the  extra- 
territoriality courts.  They  claim  that  they  should  judge 
a foreigner  who  breaks  their  laws  just  as  Japan  does;  he, 
of  course,  to  have  the  privilege  of  appeal  by  his  consul 
if  the  punishment  exceeds  what  the  foreign  law  would 
adjudge.  They  cite  the  precedent  of  the  strangling  for 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  201 


murder  of  an  American  in  1821  on  the  little  execution 
ground  between  the  pottery  jars,  back  of  the  Yamen, 
Canton,  where  so  many  Americans  have  stood  since  then, 
little  dreaming  of  this  particular  history.  How  differ- 
ently they  do  it  in  Japan  is  hereby  illustrated.  One,  F. 
J.  C.,  a British  subject,  was  sentenced  in  April,  1906,  un- 
der Article  402,  by  Judge  Satomi  in  the  Yokohama  Dis- 
trict Court,  to  twelve  years’  imprisonment  for  arson,  in 
an  attempt  to  collect  two  thousand  yen  insurance  on  his 
household  furniture,  and  five  days  were  allowed  for  ap- 
peal. It  is  largely  this  extra-territoriality  occupation  by 
foreigners  which  is  precipitating  Chinese  patriotism,  just 
as  the  shelling  of  Kagoshima  by  the  British  in  1863, 
and  the  occupation  of  Shimonoseki  and  Yokohama  by  the 
allies  in  1864  precipitated  the  patriotic  clans  upon  the 
weak  Shoguns,  and  evolved  the  new,  proud,  united  and 
powerful  Japan. 

Another  cause  which  is  solidifying  Chinese  patriotism 
is  the  lucrative  concessions,  far  more  opulent  than  at 
first  imagined,  secured  by  foreigners  at  little  cost.  I 
refer  particularly  to  the  Peking  Syndicate  in  Shensi ; the 
Franco-Belgian  Syndicate  in  Honan,  etc.  In  other 
words,  the  central  government  practically  gave  away 
provincial  concessions,  which  the  newspapers  are  telling 
the  people  are  invaluable,  in  fact  the  richest  in  the  world, 
as  Richtofen  long  ago  prophesied.  Neither  are  the  bitter 
memories  of  Peking  in  1900  forgotten  in  this  connection. 
Popularly  translated,  the  significant  comments  run  about 
as  follows : “ And  why  does  the  foreign  soldier  shoot  ? 

Just  to  loot,  loot,  loot!  ” The  soldiers  of  Yuan  Shi  K’ai 
will  tell  you  how  the  Russians  in  1900  piled  precious 
blackwood  furniture  outside  the  walls  of  Tong  Tchow, 
and  set  fire  to  it  just  to  warm  their  hands,  and  how  they 


202 


THE  CHINESE 


dug  up  the  native  cemetery  of  Tientsin,  to  exhume 
the  valuables  buried  with  the  dead. 

There  remains  the  bugbear  of  the  Chinese  Exclusion 
Acts  in  America  and  Canada,  which  the  Chinese  would 
have  been  entirely  patient  with,  had  not  the  Japanese 
been  accorded  an  astounding  preference.  It  ought  to 
be  a very  simple  thing,  considering  the  higher  standards 
of  living  and  education  in  the  white  countries  as  com- 
pared with  the  yellow,  and  the  high  tariff  burdens  upon 
the  poor  in  the  white  countries,  to  exclude  once  for  all 
day  laborers  from  emigration  across  the  Pacific. 

A popular  fete  of  the  people  held  in  July  throws  a 
pleasant  light  upon  a phase  of  their  patriotism.  To  the 
foreigner  this  festival  seems  to  be  a pretty  boat  carnival, 
which  originated  at  Chang  Sha  near  the  Tung  Ting  Lake, 
but  the  races  are  preceded  by  the  religious  ceremony  of 
searching  for  the  body  of  Ken  Yuen,  a famous  popular 
minister  whom  the  Emperor  dismissed  for  urging  re- 
forms, and  who  thereupon  committed  suicide  by  drown- 
ing in  the  year  450  B.  C.  The  dragon  boats  came  to  be 
used  because,  the  legend  is,  the  gifts  were  stolen  by  a 
fierce  sea  monster.  The  fishermen  therefore  adopted  the 
all-conquering  dragon’s  head  and  tail  for  the  bow  and 
stern  of  their  long,  narrow  racing  boats.  Here  is  a 
national  ceremony  of  patriotism  continued  uninterruptedly 
for  two  thousand  three  hundred  years.  In  the  blue  Hang- 
chow cemetery  is  a remarkable  iron  statue  of  four  offi- 
cials loaded  with  chains,  kneeling  before  the  door  of  the 
tomb  of  the  patriot.  General  Yoh,  the  leader  of  the  Sung 
forces  whom  they  murdered  in  treacherous  alliance  with 
the  Tartars.  It  is  probably  the  only  monument  con- 
demning official  infamy  in  the  world.  Respect  for  the 
antiquity  of  the  human  race  must  grow  in  our  minds 


CHINA,  rOLITlCAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  203 


when  we  consider  that  in  conversing  with  the  Chinese  of 
to-day,  we  are  really  conversing,  because  of  their  un- 
changed customs,  laws  and  physiognomy,  with  men  ex- 
actly similar  to  those  who  were  contemporary  with  the 
men  of  Babylon.  China  has  another  interest  for  the 
dwellers  on  the  North  American  continent,  in  that  the 
coal  deposits  and  range  formation  reveal  a land  geologic- 
ally speaking  contemporaneous  with  our  own,  which 
starts  some  inquiries  as  to  the  age  of  our  Indians,  and 
their  possible  descent  from  the  Chinese,  whether  via  the 
Aleutian  isles,  or  junks  drifting  via  Honolulu. 

It  is  owing  to  the  following  command  of  Confucius 
in  the  Li  Chi  (Filial  Duty)  that  the  nation  has  so  long 
remained  passive:  “ I would  teach  people  justice,  benev- 

olence and  virtue;  I would  lead  them  not  to  build  walls 
or  moats,  but  to  turn  the  weapons  of  war  into  instruments 
of  husbandry.”  But  now  behold  the  alarming  change. 

Japan  has  taken  almost  entire  charge  of  China’s  mili- 
tary schools  and  army,  or  Chang  Pei  Kun,  which  is 
assurance  of  its  advancing  effectiveness,  and  the  minimiz- 
ing of  hampering  traditions.  The  modern  military 
schools  at  Canton,  Nanking  and  Peking  turn  out  three 
hundred  officers  a year,  and  Japan’s  schools  add  seven 
hundred  Chinese  military  graduates  a year,  so  that  the 
provincial  “ armies  of  the  Green  Standards  ” are  rapidly 
being  officered  on  the  most  approved  lines,  especially  in 
the  Artillery,  Pou  To;  Engineers,  Kung  Chung  To;  and 
mounted  Infantry,  ]\Ia  To.  It  is  perhaps  premature  to 
say  that  there  wdll  be  war,  but  there  could  certainly  at 
any  time  now  be  a w'ar  in  which  China  would  be  as  diffi- 
cult to  humble  as  Japan  would  have  been  ten  years  ago, 
but  the  comparison  betw^een  these  two  countries  will  end 
shortly,  when  railways  join  the  provinces,  and  make 


204 


THE  CHINESE 


China  unsubduable,  because  united.  How  little  the  prov- 
inces have  known  one  another  can  be  judged  by  the  fact 
that  the  Yangtze  River,  “ the  girdle  of  China,”  has  a 
different  name  in  each  of  the  nine  provinces  through 
which  it  flows.  What  a vast  body  of  soldiers,  already 
inured  to  marches  on  little  food,  would  the  wheelbarrow 
men  of  Honan  alone  make,  and  Honan  sent  ten  thousand 
troops  to  Viceroy  Chang’s  last  autumn  manoeuvers,  which 
covered  an  attack  along  the  line  of  the  Han-kau-Peking 
Railway.  Moreover,  Japan  is  desirous  that  China  shall 
raise  an  army  of  five  hundred  thousand  men,  which  will 
permit  of  Japan  reducing  her  force  necessary  to  gtiard 
the  East  from  those  whose  land  hunger  she  most  hates, 
Russia,  Germany  and  France.  She  will  officer  this  army 
for  a while,  but  she  desires  that  China  shall  pay  its  cost. 
She  wants  another  half  million  of  her  own  men  for  ten 
years  to  lay  by  their  rifles  for  spindle  and  steam  hammer, 
and  make  her  rich  enough  again  to  set  to  and  take  what 
the  Treaty  of  Portsmouth  did  not  give  her. 

No  more  does  the  gong  beat  the  romantic  call  to  arms 
under  the  East  Gate  of  Canton  and  in  the  Kwan  Tois,  or 
State  Temples  of  the  God  of  War.  The  bugle  call  has 
been  learned,  and  its  windings  are  heard  in  every  plain  of 
China,  from  the  sandy  parade  ground  outside  the  Anting 
Gate  at  Peking,  where  it  first  caught  the  sound  from 
Japanese  lips  a few  years  ago,  to  the  military  common 
beneath  the  parapet  of  the  ancient  metropolis  of  the  south. 
The  former  Chinese  formation  was  the  Ying,  i.  e.,  a 
division  of  five  hundred  in  Infantry  and  two  hundred  and 
fifty  in  Cavalry,  as  the  horse  was  considered  to  be  equal 
to  a man  in  those  humorous  days  of  Demonstration, 
when  the  triangular  banner  was  anointed  before  the  battle 
was  formally  opened.  Soldiers  built  the  Great  Wall  of 


Tile  now  dislianded  Board  of  tlie  1 sung-li-vamen,  Peking,  which 
advised  the  late  Empress  Dowager  in  her  dealings  with  foreign 
powers  for  33  years  of  evasive  diplomacy.  The  Board  is 
now  reorganized  in  the  more  enlightened  Wai-wu-pu. 

Two  members  of  the  Board  are  Manchus 
and  two  are  Chinese. 


I In-  famous  AiiU'rican  I, citation  huildiii”'  on  ('liiao  Min  llsiant; 
Strnct,  IV-kiiiij,  wliicli  wamt  tlk-  two  sios^cs,  first  liv 

tiu’  lloxi'i's,  and  lator  hy  tlu'  fori'iyjn  .allios,  in  i()oo. 


Cliinese  officials  at  Amoy.  Xov..  1908,  entertaining  officers  and 
crews  of  American  fleet.  Admiral  Emery  jiroposing 
health  of  Emjiress  Dowager 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  205 


China,  as  they  probably  did  the  Pyramids.  Soldiers  in 
China  have  always  acted  as  masons  of  public  works,  street 
sweepers,  and  grasshopper  catchers  in  country  districts; 
but  under  the  new  system,  their  respectability  is  enhanced 
by  release  from  these  duties.  There  is  an  old  proverb  of 
theirs  which  describes  the  past ; “We  make  our  soldiers 
from  our  worst  men,  just  as  we  make  our  nails  from  our 
worst  iron.” 

These  efforts  of  China  should  be  looked  upon  with 
friendliness,  for  government  must  now  become  more 
effective,  and  there  should  be  fewer  causes  for  alter- 
cation under  the  more  thorough  regime  of  a newly 
centralized  government,  with  viceroys  powerful  in  their 
provinces  by  coordinate  law  and  arms,  and  not  by  cor- 
ruption, all  of  which  will  give  place  in  time  to  power 
directed  by  provincial  and  national  deliberative  assem- 
blies. A China  which  will  not  allow  any  or  every  na- 
tion to  camp  on  the  edge  of  her  robe,  just  because  she 
w'ears  a long  one,  and  take  a bite  off  her  rice-cake  and 
persimmon  without  asking  permission,  just  because  they 
look  appetizing,  a China  more  responsible  because  she 
is  encouraged  in  self-respect,  should  find  extended  to  her 
the  friendly  hands  of  the  nations.  This  has  really  been 
the  intent  of  the  friendly  policy  of  America,  and  the 
coercive  diplomacy  of  England  for  sixty  years.  When 
China  understands  it  so,  she  will  rank  Elliot  as  her  friend 
above  “ Chinese  ” Gordon.  China  at  last  is  doing  her 
part  toward  ending  the  regimes  of  bluster  and  interna- 
tional bad  manners,  and  binding  the  last  link  around  the 
globe  of  arbitration  as  the  means  of  settling  disputes, 
because  none  dares  try  any  other.  When  it  comes  to 
standing  up  like  men,  and  taking  that  most  bitter  of 
medicines,  the  payment  of  a national  indemnity,  history 


2o6 


THE  CHINESE 


records  the  fortitude  of  the  Chinese  on  every  occasion. 
The  opium  war  indemnity  of  twenty-one  millions  was 
paid  promptly,  and  the  indemnities  to  Japan  and  the 
allied  powers  are  of  recent  liquidation.  What  volumes 
this  speaks  for  the  sincerity,  patience,  and  lack  of  false 
pride  of  this  race!  In  the  West,  right  consists  of  dying 
rather  than  admitting  you  are  nationally  wrong. 

There  are,  of  course,  those  in  China  who  fear  that  the 
new  armies  will  become  the  State,  as  it  is  becoming  in 
Japan,  and  as  it  was  in  Rome  in  the  days  following  Sylla. 
China’s  foreign  wars  have,  till  now,  been  carried  on  by 
the  provinces  separately,  Kwangtung  fighting  England 
in  the  Opium  War,  and  even  as  late  as  the  China-Japan 
war,  in  which  one  province  and  a dependency  (Chili  and 
Manchuria)  took  part  against  the  invader  without  the 
assistance  of  the  other  provinces.  The  extension  of  rail- 
ways and  newspapers  are  therefore  prerequisite  to  united, 
militant  China. 

There  is  indisputably  something  seismic  at  present  dis- 
turbing this  great  people,  something  probably  comparable 
to  the  forgotten  upheavals  which  ejected  Kublai  Khan, 
Attila  and  Cyrus  into  history.  Only  the  other  day,  in 
this  country  where  as  yet  news  travels  slowly  and  where 
railways  are  few,  fifty  thousand  men  arose  in  the  extreme 
south,  and  started  on  their  way  to  the  extreme  north,  to 
the  wheat  fields  of  Manchuria,  where  the  government,  re- 
membering the  successful  repeopling  of  Szechuen  from 
Kiang-si  after  the  Ming  rebellion,  offered  each  man  ten 
mao  of  land  free  of  taxes  for  five  years.  The  movement 
was  certainly  not  political,  like  those  we  constantly  hear 
the  Triad  Society  is  launching,  with  foreign  missionaries 
as  an  excuse,  but  riots  at  Canton  and  Chifu  eddied 
round  it,  men  longing  in  their  strength  to  be  as  effective 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  207 


or  as  troublesome  as  other  mortals  who  seek  new  things 
because  they  are  disgusted  W'ith  past  things.  Their  ora- 
tors pointed  out  the  black  breath  of  w'ar-ships  on  the  hori- 
zon, and  the  white  battleship  of  the  United  States,  the 
Wisconsin,  in  the  offing,  and  said : “ We  too  could  own 
such,  only  w^e  would  paint  it  yellow.”  We  who  heard 
them,  felt  that  they,  too,  could  pick  up  the  word  Jung 
(glory)  and  follow  it  as  terribly  as  other  races  have  done, 
or  as  their  Genghis  did.  Strict  surveillance  is  kept  at  the 
treaty  ports  that  no  arms  are  smuggled  in,  but  somehow 
or  other  the  astute  Japanese,  especially  through  the  port 
of  Macao,  are  getting  rid  of  their  obsolete  guns  through- 
out China,  where  the  students  by  tens  of  thousands  are 
eager  to  possess  a rifle.  There  is  something  of  a nuisance 
in  this,  internationally,  as  it  is  found  that  the  pirates  of 
the  \\'est  River,  who  previously  have  been  poorly  armed, 
are  now'  more  than  a match  for  the  government  gunboats. 

The  power  of  the  viceroys  or  Tsung  Tubs,  who  rule 
without  legislative  assembly  or  Censor  Board,  may  be 
judged  by  that  exercised  by  the  late  Chum  in  the  Two 
Kwangs,  who  had  his  owm  army,  navy  and  mint.  With 
headquarters  at  Canton,  he  led  in  the  anti-foreign  boy- 
cott of  1905-6,  and  in  all  the  new  movements  of  reviving 
Chinese  pride  and  patriotism.  He  it  was  who  conceived 
the  idea  of  a port  at  old  Whompoa,  and  railway  con- 
nection to  Canton,  in  order  to  displace  Hong-Kong  as  the 
emporium  of  southern  China.  Viceroy  Tsen  Chum 
Hsuen,  know'n  to  most  foreigners  as  the  “ unpopular 
Chum,”  was  not  a native  of  either  of  the  two  provinces 
which  he  governed.  He  not  only  headed  the  civil  and 
judicial  service,  but  commanded  the  army  and  navy. 
Twenty  million  people  bowed  to  his  unquestioned  author- 
ity. His  aim  was  to  drill  in  the  south  an  army  of  one 


208 


THE  CHINESE 


hundred  thousand,  which  should  reach  the  recent  credit- 
able j)erformance  of  the  Pechili  army  of  Yuan  Shi  K’ai’s 
(also  a Chinese  and  not  a Manchu),  which  the  Han- 
Yang  arsenal  equipped  with  “wireless”  wagons;  rifles 
of  Mauser  pattern;  field-guns  painted  gray;  Japanese 
kits  weighing  fifty-four  pounds,  which  included  acces- 
sories for  “ first  aid,”  field-glass  and  blanket.  The  Ger- 
man goose-neck  step  and  swinging  of  the  left  arm  are 
practised  on  march.  In  September  last  the  Kwang-si 
branch  of  this  army,  in  order  to  suppress  a rebellion  at 
Limchow,  made  in  one  day  over  bad  roads  through 
mountainous  country,  two  hundred  li,  or  sixty-five  miles, 
in  forced  marches.  Uniforms  are  of  red-trimmed  khaki. 
It  is  interesting  to  recall  that  the  uniforms  of  the  Boxers 
were  red  and  black.  The  southern  army  carries  triangu- 
lar banners;  the  northern  square. 

The  bugle,  and  not  word  of  mouth,  is  now  used  for 
command,  and  regimental  songs,  patterned  on  the  Japa- 
nese style,  are  taught  with  the  idea  that  the  esprit  de  corps 
is  raised  thereby.  For  a while  the  Tartar  general’s 
troops  in  residence  were  added  to  Chum’s  forces,  but  he 
returned  them,  as  he  desired  to  appeal  to  local  enthusi- 
asm. The  Tartar  troops  are  paid  two  dollars  and  ninety 
cents  Mexican  a month.  Chum  paid  his  provincial  troops 
eight  dollars  Mexican  a month.  The  ribbons  were 
taken  from  the  men’s  queues,  which  were  rolled  tight 
under  their  caps.  Such  is  the  force  which  Chum  turned 
over  to  his  successor,  Chow  Fu.  Chum  was  removed 
largely  because  of  the  protests  of  Hong-Kong  over  the 
piratical  attack  on  the  Sainam.  He  will  be  heard  of 
again  when  radical  things  happen  in  China.  He  and  his 
sort  have  been  emboldened  by  their  dream  of  awakening 
national  possibilities,  and  engraven  on  their  hearts  is 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  209 


the  recovery  of  Formosa  and  Manchuria  from  the 
Japanese  and  Russians.  We  must  not  despair  of  Chinese 
ambitions  and  liberties  because  the  new  leaders,  in  driving’ 
the  chariot  of  progress  over  the  narrow  barrow  roads  of 
a past  civilization,  constantly  find  one  wheel  either  lost  in 
the  fetid  ooze,  or  jolting  upon  the  rocks  of  the  ditch. 

There  is  on  the  other  hand  the  Japanese  version  of  the 
future  of  China,  which  is  a division  ten  years  hence  of 
China’s  “ invalid  sovereignty  ” into  spheres  of  influence, 
until  such  time  as  Japan  is  able  financially  to  gather  all 
the  spheres  into  her  own  bundle  as  she  did  the  Korean, 
Formosan  and  South  Manchurian.  The  persistent  hu- 
manitarian tendency  of  the  Chinese  crops  through  even 
the  soldier’s  armor  in  the  following  Mongolian  maxim: 
“ What  was  the  most  magnanimous  act  ever  known  ? 
When  General  Tso  burned  the  unread  correspondence  of 
the  implicated  in  the  tents  of  the  vanquished.” 

Again  there  is  the  American  and  British  version,  that 
there  certainly  must  sometime  be  a conflict  on  the  Pa- 
cific for  leadership,  which  Japan  now  arrogates  to  her- 
self. It  will  then  be  necessary  for  America  to  destroy 
Japan’s  navy,  whenever  Britain,  Russia  and  America 
agree  on  the  integrity  of  China;  the  evacuation  of  Man- 
churia by  Japan  and  Russia;  the  retention  of  India  by 
Britain,  and  Korea  by  Japan,  and  the  patrol  of  the  Pacific 
by  America,  just  as  the  Atlantic  seas  must  be  delegated 
to  British  fleets.  The  sooner  this  comes  the  better,  from 
a humanitarian  point  of  view.  It  alone  can  save  to  the 
white  man  that  distant  empire  which  fronts  the  Southern 
Cross,  and  that  Canada,  which  for  one  thousand  miles 
looks  out  on  the  broad  blue  swells  of  the  portentous  Pa- 
cific. In  their  scheme  to  impress  the  Chinese  that  they 
alone  are  masters,  socially,  the  Japanese  working  in 


210 


THE  CHINESE 


China  resign  from  any  work  when  a European  is  placed 
over  them,  saying:  “Shall  the  torch  of  Asia  bow  to 
candles;  has  the  East  not  hurled  back  the  phalanxes  of 
Alexander,  the  legions  of  Rome,  the  cavalry  of  the 
Crusaders,  and  the  artillery  of  Russia? — and  we  can  re- 
new the  lesson  to  Europe  any  time.” 

In  the  East  we  constantly  observed  in  print  the  name  of 
Mutsuhito,  Emperor  of  Japan,  and  we  continually 
heard  Banzai  (I  wish  you  a myriad  years)  called  out  by 
the  fervid  Japanese  at  mention  of  his  name,  but  seldom 
in  China  did  we  hear  the  name  of  the  late  Kwang  Su,  the 
Tsing  Emperor  and  High  Priest  of  China,  who  had  been 
reigning  thirty-four  years  at  the  time  of  his  death  in  No- 
vember, 1908.  This  was  largely  because  of  the  banyan- 
like shade  of  the  skilful  but  hated  Empress  Dowager  Tse 
Hsi,  the  patron  priestess  of  the  Boxer  movement,  whose 
ability  was  so  exceptional,  especially  in  intrigue,  that  she 
far  outranked  Catherine  and  Elizabeth,  and  some  dared 
to  call  her  a Jezebel.  She  was  the  virtual  proprietress 
of  all  the  pawnshops  of  Peking.  When  the  Emperor 
was  physically  weakened  and  with  no  hopes  of  recovery, 
decrees  in  1906  began  to  bear  the  superscription  “ Their 
Majesties,”  so  as  to  allay  some  of  the  criticism.  Petti- 
coat politics  (to  be  exact  it  is  trousered  politics  where 
women  are  concerned  in  China)  might  appropriate  pres- 
ents to  the  throne,  as  under  the  Dowager  they  over- 
rode the  rights  of  the  ministers,  but  the  Chinese 
far  and  wide  love  the  office  of  even  a Manchu 
emperor  sufficiently  for  every  guild  at  New  Year’s 
time  (in  February)  voluntarily  to  send  gorgeous 
gifts  to  his  Majesty,  whose  personal  name  of  Tsai  Tien 
was  veiled  in  his  poetic  title  which  meant  “ Illustrious 
Succession.” 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  21 1 


It  is  to  be  regretted  that  at  the  intriguing  and  inhuman 
instigations  of  the  late  ambitious  Dowager,  Kwang  Su 
was  drugged  and  shelved  during  his  formative  and  clos- 
ing years,  for  the  hearts  of  the  people,  in  a land  where 
men  are  considered  alone  interested  in  public  affairs,  called 
for  a strong,  male  crown  head,  instead  of  the  comet-like 
ascendancy  of  this  effeminate  or  unscrupulous  viceroy  and 
now  that  one,  or  one  eunuch  or  another,  who  might  at  the 
time  flatter  the  queenly  ear.  Among  the  students,  who 
were  trained  in  Japan,  is  swelling  the  longing  to  cry  for 
a purpose  “ Lo  Wan  Hun”  (Hail  the  victorious  leader 
of  a myriad  of  men,)  of  course  preferably  a Ming  and 
not  a IManchu,  if  the  change  were  convenient.  Kwang 
Su  was  married  to  his  first  cousin,  who  was  older  than 
he.  She  is  a woman  of  ability  and  refinement,  and 
more  typically  Chinese  than  the  late  Dowager.  Poor 
Kwang  Su  was  a slight,  sallow  king;  in  height  not 
a Manchu;  mysteriously  contemplative;  by  nature  im- 
pulsive when  he  saw  the  right;  when  withstood,  sulky 
instead  of  determined  and  patient ; a reader ; the  most 
Buddhistic  looking  man  in  his  empire;  punctilious  in 
sacrifices  and  ceremonies ; fitter  perhaps  for  a temple  than 
a throne ; in  short  another  “ Edward  the  Confessor,”  lov- 
able enough.  The  changes  appointing  Kwang  Su’s 
brother.  Prince  Chun,  as  Regent,  and  Chun’s  son  Pu  Yi, 
renamed  Hsuan-Tung  (Proclaimed  Succession)  as  infant 
Emperor  of  three  years  of  age,  only  corroborate  the 
power  that  was  wielded  by  their  creator,  the  late  Dow- 
ager Tse  Hsi.  We  in  Hong-Kong  in  1901  closely  ob- 
served Chun,  then  eighteen,  when  he  was  upon  an  apolo- 
getic mission  to  Berlin.  He  is  now  twenty-five  years  of 
age.  His  real  name  is  Tsai  Feng.  He  has  not  the  cul- 
ture nor  the  humanitarian  refinement  of  his  brother,  but 


212 


THE  CHINESE 


he  has  more  experience,  force  and  health ; is  wider 
traveled,  and  he  is  unhampered  by  the  old  intriguer  and 
plotter,  and  her  cabal  of  eunuchs.  The  Manchu  Tsing 
dynasty  therefore  still  sits  in  the  saddle,  but  not  so  stead- 
ily as  of  yore,  for  it  is  bickering  with  the  Chinese  ap- 
pointees, as  in  the  dismissal  of  Yuan  Shi  K’ai. 

The  Chinese  in  the  south  and  center  of  the  empire  re- 
sent another  infant  Emperor  and  another  regency.  How- 
ever the  ministry  is  stronger  and  more  enlightened  than  it 
ever  was.  The  path  before  reform  is  wider  than  in  the 
past,  and  the  fruit  of  to-day,  let  it  be  now  recorded,  was 
the  seed  sown  by  Kwang  Su  in  his  liberal  and  courageous 
edicts  of  1897.  It  was  the  only  famous  thing  he  did,  un- 
less it  be  more  famous  to  be  a martyr  to  his  own  courage, 
for  it  was  owing  to  those  edicts  that  the  Dowager  and  her 
cabal  persecuted  him  for  eleven  years  unto  his  death. 
China’s  great  future  will  largely  be  founded  upon  these 
edicts,  and  therefore  the  unfortunate  Kwang  Su’s  name 
will  not  be  lost  as  though  “ writ  in  water.”  At  all  pre- 
fectural  cities  once  a year,  the  officials,  gathered  at  the 
temples  just  before  daybreak,  place  a tablet  bearing  the 
Emperor’s  name  between  Buddha’s  feet,  and  kowtow  nine 
times  nine. 

The  Chinese  are  not  only  capable  of  national  enthu- 
siasm but  have  already  experienced  one  type  of  it.  I 
refer  to  classical  examinations,  where  from  village  to 
hamlet,  and  from  court  to  remotest  district,  the  nation  has 
acted  from  immemorial  years  in  one  spirit  to  one  end. 
This  is  a unification  Japan  never  experienced  in  the 
preparation  for  her  great  upheaval.  Given  a more  virile 
subject  to  be  presented  to  the  people  than  the  book  lore  of 
Confucius  and  Mencius,  the  government  is  quite  equipped 
to  make  it  permeate  into  the  last  recess,  with  of  course 


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Doubh-trjck  Railways  in  operation,  J909 
Single-track  Railways  In  operation , 1909 
Railway  Concessions  in  effect  in  1909 


.PO«TE$  ENeR'NQ  CO. 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  213 


results  that  will  surprise  the  race  itself  and  shake  the 
world. 

That  public  spirit  is  growing  in  China  may  be  judged 
by  one  of  the  Tsou  Ku  (invite  subscriptions)  meetings  of 
the  guilds  of  Canton  and  districts  which  Chum  called  at 
the  Wan  Shao  Kung,  or  Imperial  Presence  Temple,  to 
decide  whether  the  first  funds  for  the  Yuct  Han  Railway 
(Canton  to  Han-kau)  should  be  raised  by  taxation 
throughout  the  provinces  crossed  by  the  line,  or  by  sub- 
scriptions among  the  Canton  guilds.  Two  of  the 
seventy-two  guilds  subscribed  five  hundred  thousand  dol- 
lars on  the  spot,  and  promised  one  and  one-half  millions 
in  the  immediate  future.  This  is  the  first  time  Chinese 
have  held  what  was  practically  a business  Witenagemote 
and  it  would  not  have  been  possible  now,  had  not  the  boy- 
cotts unified  the  guilds,  and  brought  them  over  to  the  New 
China  party’s  ambitions.  While  the  meeting  was  in  prog- 
ress, a rich  Chinaman  named  Lai  Kwai  Pui,  who  was  in- 
carcerated for  a political  offense,  sent  word  from  the 
prison  that  he  would  subscribe  for  fifty  thousand  shares. 
Redivivus,  the  spirit  of  Eliot  breathing  from  the  tower! 
No  race  responds  more  readily  to  appeals  for  subscrip- 
tions in  humanitarian  causes.  Voluntarily  the  Chinese  of 
San  Francisco,  themselves  afflicted  by  earthquake  and 
ruin,  cabled  ten  thousand  dollars  to  the  sufferers  by  the 
Hong-Kong  typhoon  of  September,  1906.  The  shares 
of  the  Yuet  Han  Railway  are  for  three  dollars,  so  as  to 
be  within  the  means  of  the  poorest.  When  this  railway 
called  for  tenders  for  certain  cars,  a foreign  firm  was  suc- 
cessful. It  was  proposed  by  the  latter  that  the  contract 
should  be  signed  at  the  consul’s  office,  as  had  been  the 
invariable  custom,  but  Chau  Kung  Ying,  the  manager 
of  the  railway,  stated  that  the  agreement  must  be  drawn 


214 


THE  CHINESE 


up  in  Chinese,  and  signed  at  the  railway  company’s  office 
in  Canton.  This  marks  an  epoch  in  the  commercial  rela- 
tions between  China  and  the  nations. 

The  constitution  of  Canton’s  business  community  may 
be  judged  by  the  inclusion  of  the  following:  “ Guild  of 

the  Nine  Hospitals”;  “Pawnshops  Guild”  and  “The 
Smaller  Pawnshops  Guild.”  In  the  Emperor’s  decrees 
in  the  Peking  Ga::ette  concerning  the  railway,  the 
“ Nine  Charities  ” take  precedence  of  all  other  guilds  in 
the  enumeration.  Again  think  of  a share-holders’  meet- 
ing attended  by  thirty  thousand  people  at  the  governor’s 
Yamen.  For  the  adjourned  meeting  there  this  character- 
istic proclamation  was  issued : “We  respectfully  ask  the 

Merchant  Guilds,  the  Charitable  Institutions,  and  the 
deputies  to  assemble.  All  gentlemen  are  asked  to  bring 
their  personal  jade  seals  in  order  that  the  regulations 
may  be  signed,  and  to  state  their  age,  dwelling  and  occu- 
pation.” The  most  popular  guild  at  Canton  is  the  Car- 
penters’, whose  Lu  Pan  procession  is  the  finest  given  by 
the  guilds.  Clan  and  guild  opinion  have  been  developed 
as  in  no  country.  What  has  been  lacking  in  the  nation 
in  the  past  has  been  the  newspaper,  with  its  facilities  of 
propaganda.  The  hundreds  of  thousands  of  those  who 
have  secured  the  lower  literary  degrees,  and  the  millions 
of  those  who  have  been  unsuccessful  in  the  examinations 
but  who  are  widely  read  in  the  classics,  have  created  a 
conservative  body,  influential  among  the  illiterate  in  up- 
lifting the  nation,  and  on  the  other  hand,  they  stand  as 
a restraint  against  the  possible  oppression  of  the  throne 
and  ministers,  which  latter  body,  coming  from  their  num- 
ber, fears  their  criticism. 

Following  these  demonstrations  of  the  boycott  at  the 
Hoy  Toi  Monastery  (mark  you,)  and  the  railway,  came 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  215 


a third  and  a fourth.  When  the  commissioners  on  repre- 
sentative government  returned  from  abroad,  the  students 
and  guilds  made  the  streets  echo  with  their  shouts  of  wel- 
come and  approval.  Now  it  is  parades  deriding  opium. 
Banners  are  carried,  showing  pictures  of  the  misery  in- 
troduced by  the  foreign  drug.  White  ribbons  with  blue 
inscriptions  are  worn  on  the  hats.  The  opium  dens  are 
visited  by  these  Chinese  Cromwellians,  and  the  stupefied 
victims  are  jeered.  I once  saw  a long  procession  sweep 
around  the  Canton  Bund.  The  students  were  dressed  in 
white,  and  threw  into  the  crowds  leaflets  reading : 
“ China,  wake  up,  cure  yourself  of  opium,  and  take  your 
right  position  among  the  powers.”  This  is  the  first  fruits 
of  the  new  schools.  The  Japanese  teachers  have  struck 
in  this  something  practical  and  concrete.  The  procession 
was  led  by  a boy  whose  skin  was  dyed  brown  and  who 
was  masquerading  in  a red  turban,  and  an  immense 
opium  pipe,  as  a Hindoo.  Most  of  the  banners  were 
white,  to  signify  the  death-dealing  drug  which  was 
brought  first  from  India. 

Another  indication  of  public  spirit  was  noticeable  at 
Amoy  in  August  last.  It  was  the  Emperor’s  birthday. 
The  native  shops  were  decorated  with  the  Imperial  drag- 
on flags,  festoons  of  flowers  and  branches  of  shrubs. 
Never  before  has  the  national  flag  been  so  conspicuous 
and  popular  in  one  of  their  own  ports. 

It  must  not  be  concluded  that  the  many  advances 
shown  by  China  are  altogether  creditable  to  the  students, 
who  have  returned  from  Japanese  colleges.  The  railway 
policy  was  conceived  and  carried  through  by  the  gentry 
and  merchants,  before  the  foreign  educated  students  were 
numerous.  The  students  are  fire-crackers  in  the  flame, 
and  add  eclat  to  the  demonstration,  but  the  steady  fuel 


2I6 


THE  CHINESE 


and  heat  are  furnished  by  the  conservative  element,  which 
is  the  seriousness  of  it  for  those  who  shall  make  light 
of  it.  In  August  last,  the  Canton  Municipality  decided 
to  inaugurate  the  Hong-Kong  custom  of  registering  chair 
coolies  (the  streets  are  too  narrow  for  ’rickishas).  Four 
hundred  coolies  gathered  at  the  Hoi  Tong  Chee  Temple 
on  the  Honani  side  of  the  river,  to  protest  against  the  tax 
and  tariff.  The  meeting  was  an  exceedingly  lively  one, 
and  it  can  not  now  be  said  that  a Chinaman  can  not  think 
on  his  feet.  It  is  not  the  same  sleepy,  satisfied  Canton. 
These  things  never  occurred  before,  and  they  will  not 
stop,  in  greater  causes,  now.  The  flames  of  rebellion 
could  be  stami^ed  out  in  the  Kwangs  and  the  central 
provinces  perhaps  with  the  aid  of  the  present  railways, 
but  it  might  be  a different  thing  if  Yunnan,  which  is 
poorly  policed,  should  catch  this  spirit  of  protest,  and 
have  time  to  start  the  furnace  roaring. 

A great  deal  of  amusement  has  been  afforded  the  na- 
tions by  the  vanity  of  the  Chinese  in  their  dealings  with 
foreigners  who  have  sought  them,  since  the  settlement  of 
the  colony  of  Macao  by  the  Portuguese  in  1557,  in  the 
middle  of  the  Ming  dynasty.  They  have  long  assumed 
that  theirs  was  the  Hub  kingdom,  and  that  others  were 
merely  satellites.  They  called  their  king  “ the  Son  of 
Heaven,”  and  demanded  that  European  embassies  should 
proceed  under  yellow  banners  bearing  the  motto,  “Tsin 
Kong”  (tribute  bearers).  There  is  however  much  in 
fact  to  support  China’s  pride ; that  during  the  longest  his- 
tory of  any  race,  she  has  taught  various  civilizations 
around  her  letters,  arts,  and  sciences,  and  has  preserved 
them  from  Sikh,  Vandal  and  Slav.  She  gave  birth  to 
Japan,  and  threw  that  people  safely  into  a glorious  orbit 
of  its  own,  the  heat  of  which  now  is  reciprocally  warming 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  217 


a new  spring  into  being,  as  it  swings  near  its  parent  orb. 
She  has  maintained  immemorially  the  security  of  her 
southern  valleys  from  invasion,  and  her  culture  uncon- 
taminated during  a period  when  southern  Europe  has 
known  countless  obliterations  and  denudations,  intellec- 
tually and  ethnically.  Flood  and  famine  have  visited  her 
more  cruelly  than  any  race  has  suffered,  but  to-day  she 
points  to  her  four  hundred  millions  as  a testimony  that 
she  has  abhorred  the  murder  of  war,  and  in  deeds,  if  not 
in  letters,  has  practised  the  sacred  teachings  of  the  Occi- 
dent’s “ Son  of  Heaven,”  while  we  have  lusted  after 
slaughter,  so  that  none  of  us  of  any  blood  can  show  more 
than  a tenth  of  her  population. 

Very  interesting  divisions  of  the  Chinese  race  are 
illustrated  on  the  island  of  Hong-Kong  and  at  Kowloon, 
one  mile  opposite  on  the  mainland,  these  divisions  num- 
bering throughout  the  nation,  sixty  millions  each.  For 
instance,  the  women  of  the  Hakka  race,  some  of  whom 
can  be  seen  employed  breaking  stones  on  the  military 
roads,  wear  broad  hats  fringed  with  a flapping  veil,  and 
immense  rings  in  their  ears.  They  do  not  bind  their  feet, 
or  wear  prominent  nose  ornaments.  They  are  not  so  old 
a race  as  the  abler  Cantonese,  and  other  Pun  Tei 
(ancient)  races  of  Kwangtung,  and  Szechuen  Provin- 
ces. Sometimes  they  are  called  Highlanders,  especially 
in  Kwangtung  Province,  where  they  never  succeeded  in 
dispossessing  the  plains  people.  They,  of  course,  have  a 
dialect  of  their  own.  If  one  hears  two  boat-women 
screaming  ancestral  anathemas  up  and  down  the  gamut, 
from  legendary  grandparent  to  tenth  cousin,  at  each  other 
from  their  respective  tillers,  you  may  be  sure  they  are  of 
the  Hakka,  or  “ Guests  ” tribe.  They  are  the  highest 
tempered  and  most  argumentative  of  the  Chinese.  They 


2i8 


THE  CHINESE 


largely  compose  the  armies  of  the  viceroys,  and  are  re- 
sponsible for  most  of  the  rebellions  of  the  last  two  hun- 
dred years.  A large  proportion  of  the  emigrants  to  the 
Straits  Settlements  are  Hakkas.  They  are  not  so  in- 
sistent about  marrying  within  their  race  as  other  Chinese. 
Those  who  emigrated  to  Formosa  married  the  wild  hill 
women,  and  incidentally  drove  the  brothers  of  their  wives 
out  of  the  camphor  business.  At  Singapore  they  marry 
Malays,  and  at  Honolulu,  Kanakas  (as  in  the  case  of  the 
famous  Ah  Fong  family  there,)  and  in  New  York  may 
we  say  they  are  credited  with  offering  themselves  to  ex- 
patriated Hibernians!  The  bloody  Taeping  rebellion 
was  led  by  a Hakka  from  the  vicinity  of  Canton,  named 
Hung  Siu  Tsuen. 

During  the  water  famine  in  August,  the  government  of 
Hong-Kong  turns  the  taps  on  for  only  an  hour.  I have 
seen  Flakka  bands  from  different  streets  approaching 
with  their  pails  or  Standard  Oil  tins,  dangling  from  stout 
bamboos.  A fight  easily  ensued  over  the  precedence  in 
drawing.  When  the  home  gang  was  worsted,  their 
women  retreated  to  the  gardens  on  the  house  tops  and 
threw  flower  pots  on  the  invaders,  who  charged  repeated- 
ly up  the  dizzy  stairs,  until  the  Sikh  police,  and  mush- 
room-capped native  hikongs  came  up  on  the  double.  It 
is  noticeable  in  these  rows  that  the  Hakkas  never  cry 
“help”  or  “murder,”  but  “save  life.”  The  Hakkas 
are  more  settled  in  the  land  than  in  former  times,  and  re- 
cent disturbances  have  occurred  mostly  among  the  Sang 
Miaotzes  (unsubdued  children  of  the  soil,)  likewise  a 
roving  tribe  who  have  forced  their  way  into  Mongolia, 
Szechuen,  Yunnan,  Kwei  Chau,  and  the  mountains  of 
Hainan  Island.  In  their  own  dialect  this  race  is  called 
Ba  Bu  Ren.  The  great  general  and  Viceroy  Ts’en, 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  219 


who  crushed  the  bloody  Mohammedan  rebellion  of  Yun- 
nan, and  who  incognito  would  cut  rebels  down  himself, 
was  a Miaotze  aboriginal  of  Kwang-si  Province.  “ As 
sulky  as  a Lolo,”  is  a proverb  referring  to  a trait  of  a wild 
tribe  of  the  mountains  of  Szechuen,  who  declare  that 
happiness  consists  in  being  let  alone.  This  race  acquired 
its  name  in  its  days  of  wandering,  for  “ lolo  ” is  a bam- 
boo basket  in  which  they  carry  everything,  from  ancestral 
tablets  to  knives  for  avenging  their  honor.  Among  the 
lu  aboriginal  tribes,  those  Ishmaelites  of  the  mountains 
of  Kwang-si  and  Che-kiang,  you  will  notice  that  queues 
are  not  worn.  The  hair  is  bunched  on  the  head,  and 
beards  are  not  shaved.  The  women  are  large  footed. 
All  these  races  are  fragments  of  the  rule  of  the  great 
Genghis,  and  to  a similar  leader  the  Nomadic  Tartars  and 
Mongols  would  again  respond. 

The  people  of  Szechuen  Province  are  short  and 
stocky;  those  of  Shan-tung  tall  and  bony,  while  the  lithe 
Kwangtung  men  are  notable  for  their  vivacity  and  well- 
fed  sleekness.  The  Tartar  of  the  north  is  paler  than  the 
bronzed  Cantonese  of  the  south.  If  you  believe  in  the 
aphorism  that  the  land,  and  not  the  politics,  makes  a 
people,  come  to  China  and  see  it  exemplified.  The  Chi- 
nese have  emphatically  assimilated  certain  families  of 
European  blood.  To  recite  three  instances.  At  Macao 
in  the  south,  the  descendants  of  the  original  one  thousand 
families,  while  retaining  their  Portuguese  names  and  re- 
ligion, are  now  nearly  all  Chinese  by  blood  through  inter- 
marriage. At  Kaifong  in  the  central  provinces,  a colony 
of  Jews  has  lost  names  as  well  as  religion,  and  near 
Peking  are  the  names,  but  little  of  the  blood,  of  the  fam- 
ilies of  the  Russian  prisoners  who  were  captured  at  Al- 
bazin  in  the  time  of  Peter  the  Great,  and  who  were  first 


220 


,THE  CHINESE 


corralled  in  the  famous  “ Russian  House  ” at  Peking. 

While  nearly  all  the  emigrations  to  America,  Singa- 
pore and  the  Philippines  have  been  from  Canton  in  the 
south,  it  is  remarkable  that  the  emigration  to  Africa,  re- 
cruiting for  which  ceased  in  November,  1906,  was  from 
Shan-tung  in  the  north,  where  the  coolies  are  taller  and 
handsomer,  but  not  so  intellectual  as  the  Southern  China- 
man, who  has  more  of  the  aboriginal  Highlander  blood 
in  his  veins.  Behind  all  the  new  counters  in  the  bazaars 
of  Chemulpo  and  Mukden,  stands  the  Chinese  emigrant, 
with  the  business  future  of  those  countries  largely  within 
his  power. 

The  honor  of  the  Chinese  has  seldom  received  a more 
significant  tribute  than  in  the  arrangement  for  foremen 
over  the  laborers  in  the  Rand,  and  wherever  large  gangs 
of  Chinese  have  been  employed.  Among  the  Huns  in 
the  coal  mines;  Italians  in  street  work;  and  our  own  peo- 
ple in  building,  there  is  no  gang  of  laborers  larger  than 
a dozen  under  one  foreman.  When  Chinese  are  em- 
ployed, a contractor  estimates  one  foreman  for  every  one 
hundred  men.  Give  this  race  a task  which  they  can 
comprehend,  and  the  sense  of  duty  appeals  to  them  as  to 
no  other  people.  It  is  the  exclusion  of  Chinese  labor 
which  has  retarded  the  progress  of  the  Philippines.  Jap- 
anese labor  prefers  other  fields  to  the  enervating  tropics, 
although  a limited  number  of  Japanese  are  permitted  to 
land  in  the  Philippines,  where  they  become  ’rickisha  cool- 
ies. The  soil  under  such  amorous  suns  yields  too 
abundantly  to  compel  the  Filipino  to  arouse  himself. 
The  Chinaman,  whether  from  the  hot  Kwang  and  Fu- 
kien Provinces  or  from  cooler  Shan-tung,  works  like  a 
beaver  in  the  tropics.  He  is  reclaiming  Siam,  Java  and 
Malay,  and  if  he  were  permitted  he  would  create  of 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  221 


Luzon,  Minclinao  and  Panay  the  most  luxuriant  garden 
of  sorghum,  hemp,  cocoanut,  banana,  and  mahogany 
that  the  world  has  ever  seen.  Nothing  will  ever  be  made 
of  the  Filipino,  and  schools  will  be  wasted  upon  him,  as 
they  have  been  upon  the  “ ignorantly  read  ” Bengalese, 
who  spouts  dangerously  and  ungratefully  of  home  rule, 
because  sedition  and  a little  learning  easily  run  to  adjec- 
tives. Sheer  need  would  ultimately  compel  the  Filipino 
to  follow  the  example  of  the  Chinaman,  when  the  emi- 
gration of  the  latter  could  be  stopped,  until  such  time  as 
the  native  backslid  from  his  acquired  ways  of  industry. 
In  all  the  world, — Kaffir,  Somali  Arab,  Mexican  peon 
or  government-rationed  Indian, — there  is  nothing  that 
can  wear  the  folds  of  determined  laziness,  without  creas- 
ing them,  so  long  as  the  Filipino.  A stalwart  friend  of 
Chinese  emigration  from  an  educational  standpoint,  was 
Secretary  Seward.  As  the  returning  emigrants  are  en- 
riching Italy,  so  the  Chinese  emigrant  brings  modern  en- 
lightenment back  to  his  native  land. 

Here  is  an  interesting  tale  of  the  emigrants  for  a 
Chinese  Boccaccio,  and  one  quite  unusual  for  China 
where  women  are  seldom  faithless.  Outside  the  vil- 
lage of  Fatshan  only  a day’s  walk  from  Canton,  in 
an  ancestral,  tiled,  stone  farm-house,  where  a brake  of 
millet  stalks  whispered  peace  from  generation  to  gen- 
eration, lived  a patriarch  alone  with  his  young  daughter- 
in-law.  The  son  was  absent  in  America,  where  a 
Chinese  wife  might  not  follow  him  according  to  our 
law.  Regularly  the  old  man  came  in  to  Canton  and. 
stayed  with  a friend  until  the  Han-kau,  with  an  eye  for 
“ good  josh  ” painted  on  its  paddle  wheel,  sailed  in  the 
morning  for  Hong-Kong.  The  next  day  he  went  to  the 
Hong-Kong  and  Shanghai  Banking  Corporation,  sur- 


222 


THE  CHINESE 


rounded  palatially  with  royal  palms  on  Queens  Road 
Central,  to  cash  a draft  from  his  son,  and  with  so  great 
a fortune  to  support  himself,  he  retraced  his  steps  to  the 
Fatshan,  which  sailed  in  the  evening.  From  Canton 
he  started  out,  between  the  rice  fields  and  duck  farms,  on 
his  joyful  tramp  homeward,  where  the  “ Comfort  of 
His  Age,”  his  daughter,  awaited  him.  Alas!  The  in- 
auspicious shade  of  the  papaw  seemed  to  lie  long  upon 
the  threshold.  A Lothario  came  upon  the  scene  in  the 
person  of  a farm-hand,  seeking  work  under  an  alias  that 
frightened  the  old  man,  for  it  was  not  a clan  name.  The 
daughter-in-law  fatefully  interposed,  and  the  worker  was 
given  the  petsai  field  to  till.  Being  a married  woman,  the 
daughter  also  aided  in  the  field.  Shortly  an  elopement 
was  planned,  and  fortunately  wits  rather  than  murder 
were  used  to  secure  the  four  hundred  dollars,  which  the 
old  man  had  saved.  Paper,  ink-stick  and  brush  were  se- 
cured, and  the  absent  husband’s  white-wood  “ chop  ” was 
resurrected  from  the  camphor-wood  chest.  Chinese  char- 
acters are  easily  forged.  A letter  from  the  son  was  pre- 
pared, begging  the  fond  father  to  give  money  to  the 
daughter  to  go  to  America  to  join  her  husband.  She 
should  come  if  possible  with  some  clansman  who  was 
emigrating,  and  with  whom  he  could  communicate  at  Vic- 
toria regarding  a plan  which  he  hadi  for  circumventing 
the  Exclusion  law.  The  old  man  stepped  into  the  trap; 
the  farm-hand  had  always  been  desirous  of  emigrating. 
For  his  kindness  in  the  dilemma,  the  old  man  would  ad- 
vance him  the  remainder  of  his  funds.  The  three  arrived 
at  Hong-Kong.  The  sea  was  of  course  too  rough  for  age 
to  take  the  sampan  trip  to  the  great  ship  which  lay  like  a 
black  dragon  cumbrous  on  the  stream.  Tears  and  good- 
byes were  exchanged  on  the  Wing  Lok  wharf.  The 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  223 


usual  shouts  of  shao  (long  life)  and  full  (happiness) 
were  wafted  to  the  rapidly  receding  boat.  The  shameless 
plotters  took  a devious  course,  and  re-landed  in  Hong- 
Kong,  much  to  the  amusement  of  the  boatmen  who  said 
they  were  ying  (mad).  The  patriarch  went  home,  and 
shortly  afterward  received  a genuine  letter  from  his  son, 
stating  that  he  was  about  to  return  home,  and  requesting 
his  dearly  beloved,  the  Pearl  of  Fidelity,  to  meet  him  at 
Hong-Kong  on  the  ship’s  arrival.  Father  and  son  met 
at  PIong-Kong,  and  with  the  clan  ire  mutually  inflamed 
sought  the  culprits.  The  native  boarding-houses  on  El- 
gin Street,  which  have  harbored  so  many  secrets,  at 
length  gave  up  this  comedy  to  the  courts,  and  that  is  why 
Wong  Chik,  alias  Cheung  Yam,  won’t  bother  the  Cheung 
clan  any  more;  nor  will  the  grocery  that  he  was  about  to 
open  on  Rtia  da  Se  in  Macao  deal  in  credits,  opium  and 
rice  for  a long  while.  Mdiat  became  of  the  woman,  not 
all  China  can  reveal,  unless  the  Cheung  clan  will  some- 
time be  willing  to  tell;  the  millet  is  still  whispering  se- 
crecy around  the  old  stone  homestead  when  father  and 
son  talk. 

We  hear  much  of  the  Great  Wall,  certainly  the  world’s 
most  memorable  sight,  but  that  other  peculiar  defensive 
work  of  the  Manchus,  the  Willow  Palisade,  now  in  poor 
repair,  which  begins  where  the  Great  Wall  ends  at  Shan 
Hai  Quan  at  the  sea,  and  sweeps  around  the  sacred  tombs 
of  Mukden  to  the  sea  again,  has  attracted  less  research 
than  its  uniqueness  merited.  The  best  preserved  and 
grandest  city  wall  in  China,  encircles  the  city  of  Tsian 
Fu,  the  capital  of  Shensi,  which  province  was  the  cradle 
of  the  race.  The  wall  was  built  in  the  fourteenth  cen- 
tury, and  is  seventy  feet  in  height.  The  towers  are  not- 
able, which  can  not  be  said  of  Peking’s  ugly  towers. 


224 


THE  CHINESE 


China’s  navy  is  divided  into  the  Pei  Yang  and  Nan 
Yang,  or  northern  and  southern  fleets,  and  also  the  Cus- 
toms Cutter  service,  which  includes  the  Lighthouse  fleet. 
The  Chun  Chih  (War  Board)  is  congratulating  itself 
that  China  is  not  without  a naval  reserve  trained  at  the 
expense  of  its  critics,  for  every  American,  British  and 
German  mail  and  tramp  ship,  which  plies  from  her  ports 
across  the  Pacific,  or  Indian  and  Red  Seas,  is  entirely 
manned  with  a Chinese  crew.  The  capable  Yuan  Shi 
K’ai,  renowned  already  for  his  ambitions  for  the  army, 
was  until  his  recent  dismissal  drilling  the  nucleus  for  two 
navies,  which  since  the  war  with  Japan  have  been  used 
chiefly  as  arms  of  the  Customs  service.  The  bases  for 
this  navy  are  Changchew  and  Miao-tao  Islands  to  protect 
the  gulf  of  Pechili  and  Peking;  Chusan  to  guard  the  ap- 
proach to  the  Yangtze  Kiang  and  Shanghai;  and  Hai- 
nan, to  protect  the  south,  and  be  within  call  of  Canton. 
He  proposed  first  to  make  China  great  commercially,  to 
have  an  unexcelled  army  of  half  a million  within  five 
years,  and  then  to  build  a modern  navy  when  his  people 
called  for  that  final  flourish  of  patriotism.  The  Customs 
receipts  and  Robert  Hart’s  new  systematization  of  taxa- 
tion taken  up  by  Robert  Bredon  are  to  provide  the  money. 

As  Japan  by  edict  and  example  is  endeavoring  to  im- 
prove the  stature  of  the  race  by  inducing  the  children 
and  women  to  sit  on  chairs  instead  of  squatting  on  mats, 
the  viceroys  are  founding  throughout  China,  Tientsin 
Hui  or  Mutual  Feet  Societies  and  encouraged  by  the 
Regent  and  the  scientific  Japanese,  as  well  as  our  own 
missionaries,  tlie  movement  is  spreading.  It  can  affect 
only  the  rich  and  the  apisli  among  the  middle  class,  as 
the  poor  and  all  of  the  Hakka  tribes  never  bound  the 
feet.  No  candidates  are  now  taken  into  the  Civil  Service 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  225 


wliose  wives  or  daughters  practise  the  custom.  1 he 
Board  of  Education  has  stepped  in  with  an  edict  pro- 
hibiting  the  manufacture  of  small  shoes  for  the  kin 
lien,  or  golden  lilies,  as  bound  feet  are  called.  The 
traveled  Chinese  are  quite  argumentative  that  disgust- 
ing as  binding  the  feet  is,  it  can  not  affect  the  health  of 
offspring  as  does  the  western  custom  of  lacing,  nor  has  it 
ever  affected  so  large  a proportion  of  the  population  as 
has  the  western  distortion.  Moreover,  the  Chinese  reply 
that  the  binding  of  feet  has  no  voluptuous  motive  of  re- 
vealing the  lines  of  the  figure,  which  in  their  women 
rather  they  conceal,  even  to  the  extent  of  binding  the 
breasts  down,  and  they  are  accordingly  insistent  regard- 
ing their  superior  personal  purity.  In  this  argument 
between  Paris  and  Peking,  the  impartial  probably  must 
regret  that  the  third  party  eligible  to  judge,  the  Atnah 
Indians  of  British  Columbia,  who  bound  their  heads, 
has  passed  into  oblivion. 

On  approaching  Shanghai  on  the  broad  yellow  flood 
of  the  Huang  Phu,  one  w’onders  if  this  can  really  be  the 
threshold  of  crowded  China,  for  not  a soul  or  a hut  is 
to  be  seen  in  the  brakes  along  the  shore.  The  low 
flooded  fields  east  of  the  Huang  Phu  are  impossible  of 
cultivation  until  modern  engineering  skill  wades  in  and 
saves  the  sunken  but  extremely  fertile  meadows.  Bile- 
like and  unpromising  is  the  approach  to  Taku,  on 
whose  flat  shore  a few  thin  birches  and  willows  fail  to 
relieve  the  scene.  But  in  the  south  is  the  grandeur 
which  one  expected  of  the  north,  making  the  coast-line 
just  the  opposite  in  appearance  of  America’s  eastern 
shore.  Particularly  stern  is  the  landscape  of  much  of  the 
eastern  part  of  the  province  of  Kwangtung.  The  Hakka 
grass-cutters  have  burned  everything,  excepting  a few 


226 


THE  CHINESE 


firs  of  ten  years’  growth,  which  the  British  have  sowed 
on  the  granite  hills  of  Kowloon.  The  houses  are  of 
granite  blocks,  and  are  thatched  or  tiled,  in  comparison 
with  the  bluish  brick  huts  of  Shan-tung  Province.  In 
contrast,  think  of  the  mud  hovels  of  Mohammedan  Kansu 
Province  and  of  Pechili,  or  the  cliff  dwellings  of  Shensi 
Province,  or  even  the  bamboo  and  thatch  huts  of  Sze- 
chuen  Province. 

Here  and  there  a person  of  artistic  soul,  or  a monk, 
will  have  protected  a wide  banyan,  whose  branches  lean 
like  a bowed  patriarch  upon  many  rooted  canes.  Some- 
times a wind-break  has  been  preserved  of  evergreen 
orange  and  loquat,  yellow  syringas,  or  cotton-trees  with 
their  large  red  flowers.  Now  and  then  you  see  a shining 
green  camphor-tree  among  the  rain-smoothed  rocks. 
Where  it  is  not  tapped  too  often,  this  tree  grows  to  a 
magnificent  size.  The  wood  is  in  great  demand  in  the 
extensive  pawnshop  towers  of  the  southern  provinces, 
where  it  is  used  to  make  trunks  for  clothes.  The  odor 
is  a powerful  defense  against  the  attacks  of  moths  and 
white  ants.  The  wood  is  a golden  yellow,  clouded  with 
one  wide  brown  vein,  and  when  polished  is  silky  smooth 
and  gorgeous  enough  for  even  the  exactions  of  an  ori- 
ental connoisseur.  Because  of  the  dark  vein,  the  wood 
is  not  used  for  carving,  but  at  Ningpo  they  find  a white 
Avood  which  holds  the  knife  well  and  takes  a polish.  In 
the  northern  provinces  the  familiar  ailantus  tree,  willow, 
and  roseate  rhododendron  are  frequently  seen,  and  in  the 
valleys  of  Che-kiang  Province  the  deep  green  leaves  of 
the  arbor-vitse  cast  shadows  over  the  pale  green  rice 
])atches.  In  Korea  the  ranges  remind  you  of  turbulent 
Atlantic  seas,  suddenly  fi.xed  in  stone.  All  coastal  south 
China  and  western  Szechuen  are  an  array  of  white  gran- 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  227 


ite  peaks,  the  oldest  formation  of  the  country.  Indeed, 
three  hundred  thousand  square  miles  of  China  consist  of 
lofty  ranges.  Can  any  land,  which  at  the  same  time  sup- 
ports a vast  population,  so  boast  of  affording  her  toilers 
the  uplift  of  stupendous  scenery,  when  labors  are  laid 
down,  and  the  eyes  of  the  worker  raised  above  the  toil  at 
his  feet  ? These  are  they  who  work  indeed  as  in  the  sight 
of  God.  In  most  of  the  foot-hills  are  cut  the  horseshoe 
shaped  and  blue-painted  graves  of  the  wealthier  Chinese, 
many  of  which  graves  ancestor  worship  and  clan  organ- 
ization have  preserved  to  ages  hoary  in  comparison  with 
our  oldest  monuments.  “ The  dead  must  see  farthest,” 
is  a Chinese  saying,  when  they  explain  these  scenic  loca- 
tions. 

In  every  valley  of  Kwangtung,  hid  behind  barricades 
of  palest  green,  brown-plumed  millet  (kaoling),  tufted 
muk-kwa  (papaw),  or  needlewood  fir-trees  are  huddled 
the  low  stone  houses  of  the  villagers,  that  they  may  be 
near  their  rice  swamps,  and  shan-yn  (sweet  potato)  ter- 
races. The  women  who  do  not  have  to  work,  are  dressed 
in  colors  which  rival  the  flowers  about  them  for  briglit- 
ness,  and  it  is  from  nature  altogether  that  they  have  taken 
their  styles  of  color  and  ornamentation.  You  will  notice 
that  the  rice  is  not  sown  broadcast  and  harrowed  into  a 
field,  which  is  afterward  flooded,  as  is  our  practice  in 
Louisiana ; it  is  transplanted  into  an  already  flooded  field, 
which  custom  leads  to  many  skin  diseases  of  the  feet,  and 
to  rheumatism,  on  account  of  the  human  fertilization 
placed  in  the  water.  Over  the  tilled  patches  flutter  show- 
ers of  white  streamers,  for  the  purpose  of  disturbing  the 
foraging  magpies.  More  people  live  on  rice  than  on 
wheat  in  this  world,  so  one  can  imagine  the  aggregate 
acreage  extending  from  Cape  Cambodia  to  Shan-tung 


228 


THE  CHINESE 


Promontory.  Fringing  the  rice  swamps  are  bulrush  shal- 
lows, where  the  peasants  gather  a triple  harvest  of  food, 
fiber  and  down.  The  Chinese  farmer  only  essays  a few 
acres,  for  that  is  all  his  machine-less  toil  can  irrigate  and 
secure  fertilizer  (mostly  human)  for,  and  accordingly  the 
vast  unreclaimed  districts,  even  in  so  crowded  a land, 
are  astonishing.  In  Ceylon,  where  the  conditions  were 
the  same  until  recently,  the  importation  of  German  patent 
fertilizers,  made  largely  from  Florida  phosphate,  has 
greatly  increased  the  area  of  productive  land.  With  the 
railroad  era  now  really  begun  in  China,  we  may  expect 
a similar  transformation.  In  only  two  of  the  provinces 
is  irrigation  not  depended  upon  for  the  crops,  i.  e.,  at  the 
headwaters  of  the  Yellow  River  in  Kansu  and  Shensi. 
The  bamboo  water-wheel,  turned  by  the  buffalo,  is  in 
universal  use  in  the  ;COuntry  districts,  and  will  not  be 
supplanted  soon,  though  in  some  of  the  cities  the  mer- 
chants are  introducing  foreign  steam  pumps  for  wells 
and  reservoirs.  Where  the  village  owns  the  water-wheel 
and  buffalo  power,  the  toll  of  water  diverted  from  the 
main  ditch  is  measured  at  so  many  marks  of  a joss-stick, 
which  is  set  burning. 

The  pig,  the  chow-dog,  children  and  old  women,  alone 
roam  along  the  large  flags  of  the  streets  of  the  small  vil- 
lages during  the  day,  while  in  the  distance  the  peasants, 
dressed  in  blue  Nankeen  knickerbockers,  toil  with  bare 
sweating  shoulders  at  the  tank-sweep  and  bamboo  wheel, 
in  their  primitive  irrigation  and  abominable  fertiliza- 
tion methods.  The  oriental  sun  burns  up  all 

shadows,  except  the  violet  silhouette  of  the  tall 
pawnshop  tower,  the  roof  of  which  is  heaped  with 
large  stones,  for  ammunition  against  the  attacks  of 
invaders.  Here  Cheong,  and  his  wife  Chai,  have 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  229 


their  winter  tunics  in  pawn,  while  they  venture  the 
ten  tact  in  a lease  of  neighbor  Loong’s  six  terraces  (it 
would  not  be  lucky  to  choose  four  or  seven),  where 
petsai,  cotton,  ramie,  beans,  maize,  rice  or  sugar-cane 
are  sedulously  cultivated.  Or  possibly  he  turns  the  land 
into  peanut  patches  for  the  sake  of  the  fifty  per  cent, 
yield  of  oil.  When  Cheong  redeems  the  pledge,  he  not 
infrequently  secures  a life  mortgage  of  leprosy  for  him- 
self. All  land  belongs  to  the  government,  and  tenure 
is  evidenced  more  by  the  last  tax  receipt  than  the  original 
crown  deed.  Loong  pays  a tax  of  six  cents  a mao,  or 
twenty-five  cents  our  acre.  If  the  pirates  make  a rush 
from  the  banana  and  papavv  brakes,  the  children  on  watch 
start  a chain  of  yells,  which  sets  the  village  streets  in 
uproar  and  echo,  and  the  men  and  women  rush  to  the 
fray  from  the  fields  with  their  two-pronged  rice  forks  as 
weapons.  Sometimes  an  annoyed  farmer’s  vengeance 
is  orientally  extreme  upon  the  foreigner  who  disturbs 
his  soil.  Europeans  tramping  through  the  paddy  fields 
after  the  gorgeous  colored  and  succulent  rice-birds,  or  for 
snipe,  are,  for  a deterrent  example,  apprehended,  and  the 
indispensable  sun  helmets,  or  Calcutta  topics,  are  taken 
from  their  heads  at  midday.  There  may  not  be  a tree 
or  shade  for  miles,  and  the  sun  quickly  prostrates  the 
victim. 

China  owes  her  vast  population  to  her  finesse  in  truck 
farming.  Nearly  every  family  raises  part  of  its  food. 
With  machinery,  draft  animals,  and  the  resultant  fer- 
tilizer, she  can  conquer  wastes  which  will  support  even 
double  the  present  population.  The  present  farms  aver- 
age two  acres,  and  support  eight  persons.  Where  the 
desert  has  encroached  upon  the  land,  and  sifted  a 
blanket  of  sand  over  the  soil,  the  peasants  can  be  seen 


230 


THE  CHINESE 


cutting  cellars  so  as  to  reach  the  fertile  earth  and  till 
it.  On  some  of  the  towers  of  the  Great  Wall,  hanging 
gardens  have  been  planted  by  the  Tartar  guards  amid 
scenery  of  mountain,  pass,  rivulet  and  cloud,  with  which 
storied  Babylon  could  only  have  been  simple  in  com- 
parison. In  passing,  we  might  remark  that  no  woman 
is  allowed  on  the  wall,  as  that  would  be  a challenge  to  the 
God  of  War,  Kwan  Ti. 

The  three  provinces  of  Pechili,  Shan-tung  and  Kiang- 
su  present  scenes  of  waterways  and  small  farms  that  are 
richer  in  their  beauties  than  even  Holland’s  fertile  bor- 
ders. Theirs  is  that  gentle  beauty  that  warms  the  heart 
the  most,  because  it  least  touches  the  sublime  and  imagin- 
ative. Everywhere  the  peach,  plum  and  pear  are  in 
bloom  as  of  right  royal,  for  this  is  their  first  home.  The 
golden  Grand  Canal,  or  Chah  Ho  (river  of  flood-gates) 
flows  through  plain  and  village,  to  connect  all  things  with 
the  Father  of  Life,  the  Yangtze  River.  The  cribwork  is 
of  stone,  or  of  millet  stalks,  mud  and  cord,  and  miles  of 
the  canal  run  above  cities,  which  could  be  at  the  mercy  of 
the  rebellious  waters.  Heavy  stone  bridges,  with  balus- 
trades adorned  with  lions,  dragons,  monkey  and  elephant 
heads,  leap  from  the  plain  and  over  the  canals,  with  that 
mounting  sweep  which  we  thought  was  created  in,  but 
was  really  stolen  by  Venice  when  Marco  Polo  whispered 
in  her  ear.  The  arches  are  pointed,  semicircular  and 
Omega  shape.  They  really  look  more  like  picturesque 
gateways  that  usher  in  the  stream.  Some  are  white,  and 
others  are  clothed  in  green  and  purple  with  bean  vines 
and  convolvulus. 

The  Venice  of  China  is  Soochow,  with  one  and  one- 
half  million  inhabitants,  dozens  of  islands  and  hun- 
dreds of  canals,  all  bridged  and  walled  in  for  ten  miles 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  231 


in  circumference.  Over  the  Wan  Hsien  stream,  at  its 
junction  with  the  Yangtze,  is  the  famous  single  arch 
bridge,  pictured  so  often,  which  leaps  from  the  bank 
forty  feet  high.  On  the  top  of  the  arch  is  a three-storied 
guard-house,  with  panels  of  white  stucco  and  braces  ex- 
posed, the  eaves  of  each  story  all  curling  gracefully,  and 
a decorated  frieze  under  a fanciful  roof.  From  your 
boat  in  the  stream  you  behold  through  the  arch  far  away 
a framed  purple  conical  mount  of  Szechuen  relieved 
on  the  wide  flaming  West.  At  Fu-chau,  over  the  Min, 
until  the  flood  of  1897,  stood  the  famous  Wan  Sui  Kiao 
(Ten  Thousand  Ages)  bridge,  with  its  forty  piers  of 
monolithic  stone;  its  roadway  of  stone  blocks  forty  feet 
long  and  three  feet  thick,  and  its  balustrade  of  stone 
blocks  forty  feet  long.  Tiny  shops  used  to  line  this 
bridge,  which  was  only  fifteen  feet  wide.  In  its  bridges, 
gates,  walls  and  pagodas  of  stone  and  tile,  China  boasts 
of  ruins  w'orth  going  all  the  way  to  see  them.  Japan 
has  no  ruins,  for  she  built  in  wood.  Military  boat 
bridges,  some  with  earth  and  even  brick  roadways,  are 
in  frequent  use  on  the  tidal  rivers,  and  rope  and  chain 
suspension  bridges  join  the  dizzy  loess  cliffs  in  Sze- 
chuen. I 

Nearly  every  village  and  city  of  the  plain  prov- 
inces is  crossed  with  a tracery  of  glistening  canals,  most 
of  them  beautifully  pure  from  their  stillness  and  the 
absence  of  manufacturing,  in  contrast  with  the  swifter 
rivers  which  hold  the  yellow  loess  in  suspension. 
Through  every  field  of  palest  green,  such  as  only  the  rice 
blade  can  display,  flows  the  empurpled  flood  in  joyous 
contrast  of  color.  Innumerable  high-pooped  boats  are 
poled  along,  and  as  their  sails,  which  are  stretched  upon 
twenty  bamboo  battens,  are  not  taken  down  when  the 


232 


THE  CHINESE 


wind  falls,  they  become  lit  up  with  every  shade  of 
brown,  red  and  gold  upon  their  oblong  surfaces  in  the 
hushed  sunset  time.  The  hulls  of  the  boats  are  hid 
by  the  rice  and  sorghum,  and  the  moving  sails,  especially 
near  Soochow,  remind  one  of  the  Norfolk  (England) 
Broads,  or  the  Hackensack  Meadows,  only  this  scene  is 
the  finer  and  more  animated.  One  of  these  junks,  the 
Wang  Ho,  lately  crossed  the  Pacific  to  San  Diego  in 
seventy  days,  and  is  the  first  to  fly  the  Chinese  flag  in 
American  waters  in  historic  times,  though  the  Chinese 
have  legends  of  the  Pacific  being  crossed.  There  is  no 
place  in  the  world  where  you  can  see  so  many  sails  to- 
gether as  on  the  Hung  Tsih  Lake  on  the  Yellow  River. 
Scattered  everywhere,  far  away,  human  beings  are  hur- 
rying noiselessly,  and  before  each  is  thrown  the  shadow 
of  a cross.  In  the  center  an  enormous  flat  grass  hat, 
made  in  Hupeh,  hides  the  face,  and  at  the  ends  of  a long 
bamboo,  borne  on  the  shoulders,  are  two  large  buckets. 
These  features  stand  out  prominently  in  the  violet  sil- 
houettes of  those  who  are  for  ever  nailed  to  the  tree  of 
bondage,  but  who  have  ever  had  the  least  to  say  of  that 
bondage,  and  the  term  of  it. 

Everything  is  done  at  a trot.  Wherever  there  is  a 
spring  of  water  near  the  paths,  the  country  people  erect 
for  the  convenience  of  wayfarers.  Tings  of  four  posts,  up- 
holding a roof  of  thatch  or  tile  to  shade  a cool  stone 
bench.  There  are  few  large  forests,  but  sufficient  sophoro 
locust,  willow,  cypress  and  orange  trees,  artistically 
placed,  to  contribute  adornment  and  relief  to  the  view, 
and  rising  to  heaven  with  their  airy  towers,  are  scores  of 
balconied  pagodas,  and  monasteries  with  wide,  sweeping 
eaves.  Heathen  though  it  all  is,  the  peace  of  God  rests 
over  the  scene  more  palpably  than  anywhere  else  in  the 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  233 


world.  Tlie  noiselessness,  the  smokelessness,  and  the  dis- 
tance account  for  the  impression.  It  is  conspicuous  that 
there  are  no  fences,  one  reason  being  that  wood  is  unpro- 
curable. When  our  traveler  returns  to  America,  you  will 
notice  that  he  has  brought  his  strange  gods  with  him ; that 
he  is  a wood  and  water  worshiper.  Let  your  faucet  run, 
and  he  will  rise  mechanically  to  turn  it  off.  Injure  a 
tree  and  he  will  hunt  a magistrate ! Moreover,  the  bor- 
ders between  Chinese  farms  must  work  while  they  watch. 
If  they  must  be  marked,  mulberry  trees  are  set  out  and 
the  leaves  divided  between  the  owners,  or  bamboos  are 
similarly  planted. 

Most  of  the  rivers  roll  along  like  the  Mississippi  in  a 
steady  flood.  Only  the  Ciamu  Nu  and  Mekong  Rivers 
of  Yunnan  have  numerous  great  rapids,  and  answer  in 
that  respect  to  the  St.  Lawrence,  as  they  fall  from  the 
Thibetan  plateaus  to  the  rice  levels  of  the  coastal  prov- 
inces. Roaring  up  Hang-chow  Bay  and  the  Tsien-tang 
River  as  far  as  Hang-chow  city,  at  ten  knots  an  hour, 
flows  the  world's  most  famous  tide  bore.  The  maximum 
height  of  twenty  feet  is  reached  in  March  and  August. 
Tourists  should  behold  the  wonder  at  moonlight,  as  well 
as  daytime.  It  is  an  animating  sight  to  see  the  heavy 
junks  turn  their  bows  to  meet  the  great  wave,  and  then 
wheel  round  and  follow  it  to  a new  position  on  the  bund 
or  wharf.  What  a commotion  there  is  among  the  mat- 
ting sails,  all  weighted  with  their  bamboo  battens,  as  they 
batter  their  thin  masts!  The  Yangtze  has  lesser  rapids 
in  its  upper  reaches,  and  one  long  rapid,  the  Hsin  Tan, 
where  it  is  one  of  the  sights  of  the  world  to  see  three 
hundred  to  four  hundred  men  tugging  a boat  up-stream. 
These  tow-men  live  near  the  Red  Life-Boat  Station  at  the 
foot  of  the  rapids,  in  a dull  cluster  of  brown  huts.  From 


234 


THE  CHINESE 


their  work  they  stand  as  noble  models  for  a Discobolus 
of  Myron  as  you  could  see  anywhere.  They  pull  high 
up,  with  the  bamboo  hawser  drawn  over  their  shoulders, 
and  the  tug  comes  upon  biceps,  shoulders  and  calves. 
The  government  appeals  to  their  esprit  by  offering  re- 
wards for  lives  rescued,  Min  is  a favorite  name  for  a 
river,  another  well-known  one  being  as  far  west  as  Sze- 
chuen  Province,  where  it  empties  into  the  Yangtze. 
This  Min  River  is  famous  for  its  high-prowed  hurdling 
boats,  which  are  employed  to  slip  over  the  smooth,  large 
stones  of  the  rapids.  The  rush  is  tremendous.  Another 
peculiarity  of  these  boats  is  the  hinged  sail,  which  at 
night  is  let  down  over  the  boatman’s  family  for  a roof. 
The  only  sails  which  they  ever  furl  are  the  studding  sails, 
and  these  are  the  only  boats  of  the  Chinese  which  employ 
studding  sails. 

In  China,  as  in  India,  though  there  are  vast  moun- 
tains, the  topography  is  without  plateaus  to  such  an  ex- 
tent that  there  are  no  waterfalls,  such  as  Niagara,  Mont- 
morenci,  or  the  Victoria  Falls  of  the  Zambesi.  Nor  are 
there  great  lakes,  the  Ting  in  Hunan,  two  hundred  and 
twenty  miles  in  circumference,  and  the  Po  Yang  in 
Kiang-si,  ninety  by  twenty  miles,  being  the  only  ones 
worth  mentioning.  Accordingly,  when  Gaekwar  or 
Viceroy  come  to  America,  their  first  rush  is  to  see 
Niagara  and  Superior.  The  Po  Yang  is  studded  with 
beautiful  islands,  but  the  silt  of  the  Kan  River  has 
made  the  shores  marshy.  The  scenery  of  the  Tung  Ting 
Lake,  and  the  eighteen  rapids  of  the  Kan,  will  only  be  one 
and  one-half  days  from  Canton  when  the  Canton-Han- 
kau  Railway  is  opened  shortly.  Only  three  days  by  camel 
from  Peking  lies  the  least  known  portion  of  the  globe, 
Gobi  Desert,  one  thousand  miles  square  and  four 


CHINA,  rOLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  235 


thousand  feet  elevation,  where  men  once  lived  and  pros- 
pered until  the  feuds  of  Mongol  and  Tartar  left  the  gar- 
dens to  be  sifted  over  with  sand  by  the  winds.  Almost 
undiscovered,  China’s  great  chains  of  mountains  lie  north 
and  west,  with  the  tales  still  whispered  about  them  of 
mines  which  supplied  Khans  with  their  jewels,  and  which 
will  probably  be  found  based  to  a great  extent  on  fact 
when  Japanese  engineers  get  the  railways  to  the  foot- 
hills for  the  advance  of  prospectors. 

The  real  dragon  of  China  is  the  Yellow  River  or 
Hoang-ho,  but  called  by  the  more  reflective,  “ China’s 
Sorrow.”  In  one  thousand  years,  he  has  drowned  more 
Chinese  than  all  the  wars  of  humankind  have  slain  during 
that  period.  His  back  is  arched  five  hundred  miles,  as 
he  doubles  on  his  course  into  Mongolia,  and  his  tail 
writhes  here  and  there  from  changing  banks  for  six 
hundred  miles,  as  he  lashes  into  misery  and  death  the 
inhabitants  of  Plonan  and  Shan-tung,  who  never  know 
when  the  new  foundation  for  their  moving  huts  will  be 
chosen  for  the  path  of  their  destroyer  the  following 
spring.  A less  rapid  river  would  deposit  its  loess  higher 
up  its  course,  and  thus  fix  its  bank  below,  but  here  is  a 
suicidal  river  which  silts  up  its  mouth,  and  is  eternally 
strangling  its  middle  body.  What  the  suspended  loess 
looks  like,  every  traveler  who  has  taken  the  tender  at 
Woosung  from  his  steamer  to  go  to  Shanghai,  wdll  re- 
member; it  makes  the  heart  sick  at  once,  for  these  are 
not  the  blue  or  green  waters  of  home.  Any  who  have 
lived  at  Peking  or  Tientsin  know  what  the  dust  storms 
of  April  are  like,  when  the  dry  loess  is  caught  up  by 
the  winds  that  sweep  down  from  the  hills  of  Pechili. 
The  Orient  sun  glistening  from  every  particle  makes  the 
whole  air  scintillate  with  yellow  flame.  The  loss  to  the 


236. 


THE  CHINESE 


poor  each  year,  through  flood  devastations,  is  five  million 
taels  and  ten  thousand  lives,  and  besides  there  is  the  im- 
poverishment of  the  soil  as  the  loam  is  sifted  into  the 
sea.  In  the  same  manner,  the  Menam  is  scouring  Siam 
of  its  fertility.  We  have  nothing  at  all  comparable  in 
color  to  these  rivers,  excepting,  perhaps,  our  arch-thief 
of  alluvial  richness,  the  “ Big  Muddy  ” Missouri.  What, 
the  loess,  or  kwang  tu  (yellow  earth)  can  produce 
with  rain,  is  illustrated  in  Shensi,  where  three  crops  of 
grain  are  brought  forth  each  year.  No  fertilizers  will 
be  needed  for  years  in  the  northwestern  provinces. 
When  one  layer  gives  out,  the  loess  cliffs  can  be  pulled 
down,  and  powdered  over  the  worn-out  land. 

The  Government  is  in  a quandary  how  to  bring  relief 
in  the  valley  of  the  Hoang-ho.  Even  to  the  top  of  the 
Sin  Ling  Mountains,  in  ancient  times,  the  destroyers 
climbed  eleven  thousand  feet  and  chopped  every  tree  all 
the  way  up.  Reforestation  of  the  upper  courses,  to  miti- 
gate erosion  of  the  yellow  terraces,  would  produce  no 
results  for  a generation;  neither  would  levees  at  the 
mouth,  on  the  Mississippi  plan,  work,  owing  to  the  ex- 
filtration of  the  waters  through  the  permeable  bed  of  the 
river.  Reforestation  would  eventually  hold  back  the 
snows  of  the  denuded  hills  of  northeast  Thibet  and  Mon- 
golia, and  the  waters  of  the  only  rainy  province,  Kansu. 
This  would  diminish  the  release  of  the  tremendous  spring 
torrent  and  vast  suspended  cargo  of  loess,  and  provide  a 
steadier  and  longer  flow,  with  some  hope  of  the  banks 
being  fixed  long  enough,  first  for  binding  by  vines,  and 
for  the  later  afforestation.  It  is  the  most  awful  lesson 
in  the  world  of  the  individual  and  national  crime  of 
forest  destruction,  and  the  innocent  descendants  are  pay- 
ing ten  thousand  fold  for  the  ignorance  and  sins  of  the 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  237 


unscientific  fathers.  The  first  motto  to  be  written  in  the 
new  Chinese  copy-books  should  be : “ He  who  chops  a 

tree  without  planting  ten  is  a red  dragon  to  his  son,  and 
a white  dragon  to  his  son’s  son,  and  his  grave  shall  be 
unswept.” 

The  Yangtze,  although  rising  near  the  Yellow  River, 
with  a greater  fall  of  fifteen  inches  to  the  mile,  carries 
the  bulk  of  its  loess  well  out  to  sea,  although  it  prob- 
ably accumulates  less  loess  than  the  Yellow  River. 
So  strong  in  flood  time  and  so  shallow  in  the  rainless 
season  is  the  current  of  the  Yellow  River  in  Mongolia; 
of  the  Han  and  of  the  upper  Yangtze  that  many 
native  boats  make  only  one  trip  down-stream.  They  are 
broken  up  for  lumber  at  the  end  of  the  journey.  China, 
influenced  by  poorer  Japan  spending  three  millions  a 
year  on  a forestry  policy,  is  now  willing  to  spend  mil- 
lions for  the  control  of  the  Yellow  River,  and  the  vastest 
scheme  of  reforestation  ever  instituted  by  a government 
may  soon  be  put  in  operation.  The  reforestation  will 
probably  be  accomplished  with  the  China  fir  (Cunning- 
hamio  sinensis),  known  in  China  as  the  “ Sau  Tsoi” 
tr  and  the  Pinus  massoniana,  both  of  which  pro- 
duce a commercial  timber,  the  latter  having  the  addi- 
tional quality  for  the  southern  Orient,  of  withstanding 
fairly  well  the  insidious  attacks  of  the  white  ant.  Ger- 
many found  the  hills  of  Tsing  Tau  barren,  and  in  a few 
years  she  has  clothed  them  with  a young  forest,  so  that 
an  ancient  mariner  returning  there  would  hardly  know 
his  old  bearings.  Britain,  the  great  preceptor,  has  set 
forth  the  same  object  lesson  on  the  twenty  miles  of 
hilly  territory  between  Mirs  Bay  and  Chung  Point,  op- 
posite Hong-Kong.  There  is  a religious  sect  in  Honan 
the  members  of  which  preserve  forests,  and  at  their  festi- 


238 


THE  CHINESE 


vals,  which  are  observed  at  night,  they  hang  lanterns 
among  the  branches. 

China  could  support  even  double  her  population  if  the 
arid  stretches,  especially  in  the  northern  and  western 
provinces,  were  reclaimed  by  irrigation,  and  now  that  her 
credit  is  improving,  and  her  resources  being  developed, 
these  great  works  are  sure  to  be  advanced.  More  hemp 
should  be  cultivated,  andi  even  in  the  rich  plain  of 
Honan  this  important  product  is  not  developed  as  it 
could  be,  and  as  the  Ching  Too  men  would  work  it. 
They  are  the  most  scientific  farmers  of  the  race.  What 
the  Chinese  can  execute  in  the  way  of  dikes  is  well  illus- 
trated at  Kai  Fong,  the  capital  of  Honan,  where  the 
great  Yellow  River  has  been  turned  from  its  uninterrupted 
southern  sweep  of  seven  hundred  miles.  In  the  battles 
of  the  Mings  against  the  Manchus,  these  dikes  were  once 
broken,  and  three  hundred  thousand  inhabitants  of  the 
capital  drowned,  but  there  were  no  newspapers  then,  and 
the  world  has  forgotten  and  forgiven.  The  Chinese  are 
not  altogether  unscientific;  they  so  respected  the  first 
engineer,  Yu,  who  successfully  diked  the  Yellow  River, 
that  they  called  him  to  the  throne.  This  was  when  the 
nation  was  emerging  from  the  pastoral  to  the  agricultural 
state,  and  admired  and  needed  a Joseph  instead  of  an 
Abraham.  If  ten  thousand  square  miles  in  Japan  can 
support  forty-five  million  people;  if  the  Mormon  father 
could  turn  deserted  sage-brush  Utah  into  a garden,  the 
Chinese  without  a national  debt,  can  wlien  they  will  con- 
vert their  northwest  into  valleys  which  will  repeat  the 
story  of  the  prolific  Ching  Too  plain.  Tlieir  coal  lands 
alone  would  be  security  enough  for  any  dozen  schemes 
of  irrigation,  public  utilities,  naval,  etc.,  that  the  gov- 
ernment could  conceive;  and  the  surprises  of  modern  in- 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  230 


dustry  and  finance  can  easily  occur  in  China  almost  any 
year  after  the  Canton  to  Han-kau  portion  of  the  north- 
to-south  Tnink  Railway  is  completed.  You  will  notice 
where  the  new  Peking-IIan-kau  Railway  passes  through 
the  sand  plains,  that  the  government  has  in  a small  way 
begun  its  afforestation  work  by  planting  willows  to  pro- 
tect the  railway  embankment  from  the  winds.  The  same 
improvement  has  been  made  on  the  North  China  Rail- 
way, from  Tientsin  to  Newchwang.  The  object  lesson 
was  acquired  when  the  Chinese  commissioners  looked 
through  the  port-hole  of  a P.  and  O.  liner,  which  was 
passing  through  the  Suez  Canal,  and  beheld  the  sands  of 
El  Giser  fixed  at  last  by  the  roots  of  Scotch  shrubs. 

Second  as  a devastator  to  the  Hoang-ho  is  the  Han 
River,  which  rises  higher  than  its  width,  and  which 
drowned  only  as  late  as  June,  1906,  ten  thousand  people, 
and  in  April,  1908,  five  thousand  people.  The  visitor  in 
Han-kau  may  notice  in  the  autumn  that  the  houses  and 
booths  along  the  river  bank  are  built  on  piles  thirty  feet 
high.  At  Yelling  the  waters  of  the  gorge  rise  fifty  feet. 
This  will  tell  all  you  may  care  to  know  of  what  the  spring 
flood  is  like.  Confucius  ranked  as  the  fourth  virtue  the 
cultivation  of  the  mulberry  tree,  and  we,  the  outer  bar- 
barians, have  accordingly  been  dressed  in  finery  from  the 
product  of  the  worms  which  fed  on  the  leaves  thereof. 
If  he  had  enjoined  upon  his  countrymen  the  plant- 
ing of  the  camphor  and  the  fir  in  the  mountains  of 
the  West,  he  would  have  saved  in  the  last  three  centuries 
alone  the  lives  of  ten  millions  of  his  race  who  have  been 
drowned,  as  the  waters  of  the  Hoang-ho  and  the  Han 
reared  themselves  forty  feet  above  their  banks.  Because 
of  the  floods  in  Kiang-su  in  1907,  four  hundred  and  fifty 
thousand  people  had  to  be  fed  in  concentration  camps. 


240 


THE  CHINESE 


each  averaging  one  thousand  families.  This  is  the  first 
time  China  organized  against  famine.  The  camps  were 
patrolled  by  the  new  draft  of  soldiers.  Some  features  of 
the  camp  life  were  amusing.  Cheese  was  sent  by  the 
Canadian  government,  but  the  unsophisticated  people 
preferred  even  grass  to  this  new  food.  Only  the  Thibet- 
ans have  any  knowledge  of  milk  foods.  In  the  relief 
contributions,  America  headed  the  list  for  the  first  time 
in  charity  accorded  the  Chinese,  and  attracted  the  favor- 
able comments  of  the  officials,  who  announced  that  they 
would  influence  students  to  be  sent  to  American  institu- 
tions. The  absence  of  trees  also  causes  the  Hoang-ho 
to  drain  itself  too  rapidly  through  its  porous  loess  bed. 
In  the  first  six  months  of  1901  a drought  which  dried  up 
the  crops  of  millet,  mountain  rice,  corn  and  shanyue 
(sweet  potato),  came  upon  Shensi  Province.  One  third 
of  these  most  ancient  people  of  China  (three  hundred 
thousand)  died  before  food  could  reach  them,  though 
there  was  sufficient  elsewhere  in  the  land.  Nothing  can 
prevent  a recurrence,  except  a railway  from  Kaifong 
direct  westward  to  Tsianfu,  four  hundred  miles,  so  that 
supplies  may  be  hurried  in. 

The  Min  River  at  Fu-chau,  as  scenic  as  the  Gunnison 
of  Colorado,  contrary  to  the  general  conditions  in  the 
south,  is  rich  in  woods,  which  wave  on  cliffs  seven  hun- 
dred feet  above  the  waters.  In  a grove  of  gigantic 
Liquidambar,  oak  and  water  plum  (myrica  rubra)  stands 
the  famous  monastery  of  Fong  Kong  Tse.  Immense 
quantities  of  paper  are  produced  here,  as  the  bamboo 
grows  in  great  luxuriance  in  the  dank  and  shady  gorges 
of  the  Min.  Fringing  northern  Mongolia  is  a region 
one  thousand  six  hundred  miles  long  and  three  hundred 
miles  broad,  where  the  giant  firs  curtain  in  an  uninhabited 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  241 


night,  and  to  which  fastnesses  Genghis  Khan,  the  Charle- 
magne of  the  Mongols,  once  made  his  retreats.  The 
Kara  and  Tula  Rivers  have  washed  from  the  forest- 
clothed  sides  of  the  hundred  peaks  of  the  Ulamgum  and 
Khangai  ranges  a dark  loess  called  rine,  out  of  which 
the  life  has  been  far  from  lost,  but  there  is  not  a soul 
now  to  till  it  on  steppe  or  in  valley.  It  seems  to  have 
stood  since  the  time  of  Genghis  Khan  as  a debated  land 
between  Tartar  and  Mongol,  Russ  and  Manchu. 

Where  the  rice  field  is  not  the  source  of  wealth,  on 
higher  ground  (for  China  is  three-quarters  mountains) 
the  mulberry  growers’  huts  are  grouped.  Between  the 
trees,  tobacco  is  planted  as  a second  line  of  defense 
against  crop  failure.  The  great  drawback  here  is  the 
scarcity  of  fertilizers,  for  phosphates  are  as  yet  un- 
mined. The  mulberry  trees  are  stunted  to  six  feet  in 
height  for  eight  years,  after  which  the  shoots  and  leaves 
are  cropped  for  the  worms.  If  the  terrace  is  near  a 
foreign  settlement  at  a treaty  port,  Cheong  adds  a ruby 
persimmon  tree,  a glorious  pumoloe,  a scarlet-blossomed 
pomegranate,  or  a luscious  lychee  to  his  grove,  which 
latter  explains  why  foreigners  grow  boils  in  China. 

The  province  of  Shansi  has  been  neglected,  but  will 
come  into  its  own.  It  is  that  great  loamy  plateau  of 
three  thousand  five  hundred  feet  altitude,  buttressed  by 
granite  hills,  which  have  pushed  the  destroying  Hoang- 
ho  five  hundred  miles  from  its  course.  Here  at  Ping 
Ting  are  the  beds  which  used  to  supply  the  camel  pack 
trains  with  coal  for  Peking.  The  colors  in  the  great 
loess  ravines,  four  hundred  feet  deep,  are  of  all  hues 
and  remind  you  of  the  canons  of  the  Colorado. 

There  will  be  a day  when  Thibet  will  be  the  mountain 
resort  of  the  world.  Travelers  will  take  the  swift  Mes- 


242 


THE  CHINESE 


sageries  Maritiines  steamers,  about  twenty-two  days  in 
the  voyage  from  Marseilles  to  Tonquin;  from  Haiphong 
they  will  take  the  French  railway  now  building,  and  in 
two  days  run  up  to  the  capital  of  Szechuen,  Ching  Too, 
and  from  there  enter  a more  hospitable  Thibet  than  via 
the  Himalayan  gateway.  You  will  realize  that  your  stay 
can  not  be  long  the  first  time.  Think  of  standing  by  the 
toilers  as  they  swing  the  sickle  in  the  silvery  light  on 
plateaus  high  as  Pike’s  Peak,  while  as  high  again  rise 
the  mountains  that  are  the  ridge  pole  of  this,  our  mun- 
dane habitation.  How  quickly  the  panting  toilers  work, 
for  all  too  soon  comes  the  long  winter,  and  the  silence 
far  above  the  clamor  of  the  nations  at  the  foot-hills  of  the 
world, — Indian,  Chinese,  Caucasian. 

China,  too,  has  its  Thousand  Islands,  scattered  along 
the  rocky  coast  from  Hong-Kong  to  the  Gulf  of  Tonquin, 
and  a trip  from  Canton  to  the  French  concession  at 
Kwong  Chou  Bay  is  one  of  the  most  thrilling  in  the 
country.  So  silent,  majestic  and  apparently  uninhabited 
is  the  scene,  that  you  would  not  believe  you  were  at  the 
gates  of  the  world’s  most  populous  country.  The  rocks 
which  are  more  seismic  than  volcanic,  assume  every  shape 
that  the  imagination  can  conceive,  and  rise  purple  above  a 
quiet  yellow  sea,  which  rims  their  base  with  one  thin  line 
of  white  foam.  These  were  the  gates  the  Arabs  came 
to  in  unrecorded  days  long  before  Vasco  da  Gama  and 
Albuquerque,  and  with  surprised  dusky  faces,  peering 
from  under  the  long  lateen  sails,  asked  questions  History 
would  now  give  a good  deal  to  know,  for  we  might  like 
to  reset  some  mile-posts  of  Progress. 

The  voice  that  wins  the  wanderer  back  to  the  East, 
the  spirit  ever  calling,  is  the  remembrance  of  the  absence 
there  of  smoke,  noise  and  hurry.  This  is  the  peace  of 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  243 


Cathay : the  promise  that  there  ever  is  a to-morrow,  and 
never  an  enemy,  and  the  charm  of  it  never  departs.  Vast 
valleys  open  up  with  ten  thousand  at  work,  from  the 
pagoda-topped  hill  where  the  golden  ginko-tree,  shaped 
like  an  immense  maiden-hair  fern,  drops  its  red  fruit,  to 
the  soft  green  paddy  at  your  feet,  and  the  loudest  noise 
ceases  when  your  barrow’s  wheel  stops  creaking  in  its 
wooden  journal.  Tombs,  monasteries  and  hamlets  stand 
half-shaded  by  trees,  and  nowhere  does  smoke  or  steam 
rise  to  soil  the  blue.  A country  it  is,  inhabited  the 
longest  by  man,  yet  looking  the  youngest,  because  its 
breast  has  not  been  torn  by  mines,  or  the  insult  of  chim- 
neys been  raised  against  the  ever-vernal  innocence  of  its 
vales.  The  flora  of  all  climes  are  mixed  in  its  luxuriant 
valleys.  The  rubber,  apricot,  peach,  pumaloe,  banyan, 
arbor-vitae  and  fir  trees  blend  their  shades ; and  hemp, 
honeysuckle,  cotton,  poppies,  tobacco,  maize  and  indigo 
wave  together. 

The  sailors  of  China,  but  not  of  Japan,  still  cling  to 
the  use  of  'the  high-sterned  junks.  Without  keels,  these 
drifters  rely  for  their  course  on  the  deep,  latticed  rudder 
which  towers  as  high  over  the  water  as  it  sinks  under 
it.  They  are  helpless,  close-hauled,  but  off  the  wind,  or 
on  the  quarter,  they  make  splendid  passages.  Chinese 
waters  present  an  exceedingly  picturesque  appearance 
with  these  junks  displaying  tremendous  oblong  mainsails 
of  yellow  and  brown  matting.  They  have  no  jibs,  but 
often  carry  a jigger  mast.  The  old  Amoy  junks  were 
never  launched  without  two  tremendous  wooden  eyes  be- 
ing fastened  on  with  wooden  bolts,  the  purpose  of  which 
the  sailor  explains  in  his  Pidgin-English,  “ No  eye,  how 
can  see  ? ” The  foreign  steamboat  most  popular  with 
Chinese  was  the  old  Hankow  of  Hong-Kong,  which  dis- 


244 


THE  CHINESE 


played  two  great  eyes  upon  her  paddle  boxes.  The 
Chinese  commissioners  were  accordingly  humored  with 
the  Central  of  New  Jersey  ferry-boats  on  New  York  Bay, 
which  have  a circular  eye  painted  upon  their  funnels,  and 
the  Erie  Railroad  ferry-boats,  which  bear  the  white 
stripes  of  the  battleships  of  Japan.  It  was  a reminder 
of  the  home,  which,  with  all  its  oddities  and  supersti- 
tions, is  still  the  dearest  place  to  them,  despite  their 
widening  experience  in  affairs.  The  Canton  River  junks 
have  a low  bow,  fore  and  mainsails,  but  no  jib  or  jig- 
ger, and  from  both  mastheads  they  fly  triangular  red 
dragon  flags  with  many  tails.  In  ancient  days  they  hung 
a red  tablet  over  the  rail  amidships  when  they  were  con- 
veying an  ambassadorial  mission,  but  in  this  case  a 
green  instead  of  a red  dragon  flag  was  broken  out  aloft. 
Most  imposing  of  all,  with  their  lofty  carved  sterns,  are 
the  junks  from  Kiang-si  Province.  Until  the  Japanese 
fleet  whipped  Kublai  Khan’s  fleet  despite  the  latter’s  use 
of  powder  and  cannon,  these  were  the  vessels  which  swept 
the  seas  from  Borneo  and  Hawaii  to  Japan  and  Korea. 
Not  only  the  Chinese  navy  has  nailed  up  its  romantic 
honors,  but  in  earlier  days,  in  the  reign  of  Chung  Ti,  A. 
D.,  8o,  Chinese  armies  marched  in  victory  to  the  shores  of 
the  Caspian,  where  the  eagle  of  Rome  and  the  dragon  of 
Cathay  saluted  and  parted  in  mutual  wonderment  with- 
out fight. 

The  worship  of  high  places  is  prominent  in  the  Chinese 
religious  system.  On  a given  day  once  a year  every 
man,  woman  and  child  who  is  able,  ascends  the  highest 
peak  in  the  district,  dressed  in  the  choice  of  the  silky 
wardrobe.  It  is  the  festival  of  long  life  which  was  as- 
sured to  a philosopher  who  was  save<l  from  a flood 
thereby,  and  wrote  that  all  his  wisdom  afterward  came  by 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  245 


taking  a survey  once  a year,  of  life  from  an  exalted  over- 
look above  his  former  haunts.  It  is  at  once  a Thanksgiv- 
ing, a Good  Resolution  and  a Noah  Anniversary  day. 
The  Buddhists  build  their  pagodas  on  the  highest  mounds, 
and  you  will  hear  at  even  the  welcome  of  the  tiny  bells 
which  are  swung  in  the  eaves  by  the  wind.  Every  traveler 
is  familiar  with  the  rambling  granite  monastery  above  the 
fish  pools  at  Macao,  and  where  the  alluvial  rice  fields 
spread  a green  ocean  of  grain  around  a peak  called  oddly 
“ Lean  Dog  Mountain,”  which  was  once  an  island  in  the 
delta  of  the  Canton  River,  there  rises  another  pagoda. 
All  the  storied  way  across  the  province  for  two  hundred 
miles  along  the  West  River  from  Canton  to  Wuchow, 
pagodas  mark  the  view.  At  Han-kau,  from  the  top  of 
Han- Yang  Hill,  a white  temple  signals  across  the  broad 
Yangtze’s  flood  to  the  hundred-eaved  Yellow  Stork 
tower.  Outside  Peking,  one  of  the  most  beautiful  of  Chi- 
nese pagodas,  with  its  nine  tiers,  commands  the  view,  and 
one  hundred  miles  farther,  at  the  Emperor’s  vast  country- 
seat  among  the  Ching  Tih  (hot  river)  Hills  rises  an  elev- 
en-story pagoda  of  alternating  colored  stories  of  yellow, 
blue  and  green  tiles.  At  Soochow  rises  an  octagonal  pa- 
goda with  nine  stories  and  sixty  doors,  which  open  on  airy 
balconies  that  look  over  the  violet  bends  of  the  Grand 
Canal,  as  the  oriental  day  deepens  from  dusty  gold  to 
purple.  On  the  summit  of  Kinshan  Island,  as  you  ap- 
proach Shanghai  in  the  early  morn,  rises  another  yellow 
pagoda  of  renown. 

Speaking  of  pagodas,  and  recalling  history’s  curse  on 
destroyers  and  thieves  of  art,  one  can  not  but  repeat  the 
fame  of  that  gilt  and  white  tower  two  hundred  feet  high, 
and  four  hundred  years  old,  of  priceless  porcelain,  of  the 
Recompensing-Favor  Monastery  at  Nanking,  which  the 


246 


THE  CHINESE 


frenzied  and  burlesque  Christian  Taepings  destroyed 
in  1853.  Even  now  its  one  hundred  and  fifty  tinkling 
bells  seem  to  sound  for  the  dreamy  traveler,  from  under 
the  green  tiled  roofs  along  the  dreamy  canal  at  even.  A 
few  large  golden  tiles  of  this  pagoda  are  among  the  treas- 
ures of  the  pottery  rooms  of  the  Metropolitan  Art  Gal- 
lery, New  York.  The  most  visited  pagoda  in  China,  and 
the  ugliest,  is  the  “ Five  Story  ” one  at  Canton,  built  in  the 
fourteenth  century,  which  is  not  round  at  all,  but  merely 
an  oblong  building,  with  five  verandas  on  one  side,  built 
upon  the  Tartar  wall.  It  is  mendicant  infested.  The  pa- 
goda has  no  particular  interest  or  history,  but  it  gives  the 
best  view  of  the  city,  and  of  the  famous  grave  district  ex- 
tending up  the  White  Cloud  Hills,  outside  the  walls.  The 
octagonal  nine-story  “ Flowery  Pagoda  ” at  Canton,  built 
in  the  sixth  century,  is  less  known,  but  truly  superb.  The 
proportions  are  chaste,  and  the  cornices  are  not  exagger- 
ated. The  yellow  walls  contrast  with  the  darker  roofs  of 
the  stories.  A square  non-tapering  pagoda,  showing  Bur- 
mese influence  in  architecture,  at  Yunnan,  has  twelve 
stories;  the  balconies  all  being  unusual  for  narrowness. 
It  is  the  most  ponderous  pagoda  in  China.  The  best 
proportioned  square  pagoda  in  the  land  is  the  seven- 
storied one  at  Chu  Siung.  Its  unique  grace  consists  in 
the  height  allowed  from  the  ground  before  the  first  story 
begins.  Then  there  is  another  noted  one  outside  Ychow, 
the  eaves  of  whose  nine  stories  whisper  a forest  full  of 
Aeolian  music,  or  maybe  forbidden  secrets  about  the 
Tsing  Emperors  buried  within  its  shadow.  On  Mount 
Omi,  in  Szechuen,  there  is  a temple  which,  partly  because 
of  the  difficulty  of  ascent,  has  acquired  a name  of  pre- 
eminent holiness.  The  temple  is  placed  four  thousand 
feet  up  the  twelve  thousand  foot  mountain,  and  is  reached 


CHINA,  POLITICAL  AND  PICTURESQUE  247 


by  ten  tliousand  steps,  which  were  cut  in  the  solid  rock 
by  pilgrims.  Nothing  more  aptly  reveals  the  unsatisfy- 
ing portion  of  China’s  religion  than  these  agonizing  feats 
prescribed  for  the  faithful,  in  their  efforts  to  find  surcease 
of  inward  unrest.  In  no  land,  under  the  exactions  of  no 
religion,  are  the  penances  so  terrible,  or  the  efforts  more 
sincere,  and  therefore,  if  humankind  is  to  be  judged  only 
by  motives  in  the  Great  Day,  the  Chinese  will  not  be 
found  wanting. 

Chinese  architecture  can  readily  be  adapted  to  our 
country.  The  house  should  be  at  least  two  stories  high 
with  a cupola,  to  balance  the  parallel  curves  of  the  rising 
cornices  of  the  veranda.  The  heavy  roofs  with  wide  dec- 
orated eaves,  glistening  tiles,  and  upward  sweep  of  the 
wide  cornices,  are  infinitely  grander,  warmer  and  safer 
looking  in  our  mountains  than  the  Swiss  chalets,  and  the 
plain  surface  of  the  walls  can  be  sufficiently  relieved  in 
summer  with  awnings,  which  contrast  well  with  the  pon- 
derous effect  of  the  roofs.  Another  advantage  is  that 
every  inch  of  space  within  the  walls  is  available,  as  there 
is  nothing  of  the  execrable  gingercake  style  in  anything 
Chinese.  German  architects  are  fast  ruining  the  appear- 
ance of  Japan  with  their  architectural  productions.  For 
summer  homes  anywhere,  the  Chinese  style  affords  as  no 
other  does  opportunities  for  steps,  terraces  and  veranda 
posts,  where  potted  plants  in  bright  vases  can  be  placed 
against  a dark  colored  house.  The  plain  Chinese  garden 
which  trusts  more  to  the  individual  effects  of  flowers  and 
vases,  will  reach  the  heart  quicker  than  the  convention- 
alities of  Italian  styles,  which  make  you  think  the  gar- 
dens need  a roof  and  are  not  for  outdoors.  Such  a home 
as  I have  described  has  been  built  by  a New  Orleans  gen- 
tleman, Raul  Villon,  and  is  worthy  of  wide  imitation. 


I 


VI 

CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE 

China  ushers  the  visitor  into  her  art  life  with  delightful 
surprise.  From  the  bright  wide  streets,  bordered  with 
tamarind  trees,  of  Shameen,  the  island  in  the  Pearl  River, 
where  the  foreigners  dwell  in  English  and  French  con- 
cessions, to  a crowded  and  dirty  bund,  over  a shaky 
camel’s  back  bridge,  you  cross  to  Canton,  the  center  of 
the  artistic  production  of  the  nation.  In  your  blue- 
curtained  chair,  borne  on  the  bare  shoulders  of  speeding 
coolies,  you  swing  along  the  damp,  dark  lanes  which  are 
too  narrow  to  permit  a tree  to  root.  The  sewage  rolls  its 
noisome  tide  in  the  single  gutter  in  the  middle  of  the 
road.  No  Chinese  street  has  side  gutters.  The  large 
square  stones  of  the  paving  bear  testimony  to  an  eternity 
of  years  by  the  deep  hollows  made  by  the  passing  of 
countless  bare  feet.  At  last  you  come  to  a court  where 
three  streets  meet,  and  where  the  blackwood  cutters 
guild  is  located.  The  shops  spread  along  Tai  Sun,  Yuck 
Tsze,  and  Old  Factory  Streets.  It  is  the  sweetest  spot 
in  all  foul-smelling  Canton.  You  enter  the  stone  base- 
ment and  kick  your  way  refreshingly  through  the  fragrant 
red  teak-wood  chips,  for  they  are  not  yet  stained  the 
familiar  ebony.  The  men  whom  you  observe  carving 
the  legs  of  chairs  will  tell  you  their  forefathers  carved 
here,  too,  when  Cabot,  Columbus  and  Da  Gama  were 
only  dreaming  of  discoveries.  Once  a leg  carver  or  a 
turner  of  panels,  always  one.  In  an  adjoining  shop,  idol 

248 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  249 


carvers  are  working  on  images  which  will  be  covered 
with  gold  leaf  and  placed  before  the  incense  pots  of  the 
Tai  Fat  Tsze  Monastery.  If  you  desire  a buffet  with 
shelves,  lockers,  mirror  and  Yunnan  marble  like  the  one 
you  are  admiring,  it  will  take  Tack  Loong  and  his  sons 
a year  before  they  can  deliver  it.  Kowtow  to  Tack,  for 
he  is  an  artist  who  dreams  and  works  while  he  dreams, 
over  the  best  product  which  his  Family  Academy  can 
evolve.  His  ancestors  executed  no  better  w'ork  for  man- 
darins in  Kang  He’s  day,  when  China,  first  hearing  that 
there  was  a “ Ta  Si  Yang  Kuo  ” (great  kingdom  of  the 
Western  Ocean;  i.  e.,  Portugal),  declared  “then  it  must 
come  and  pay  homage  to  the  whole  earth’s  Shang  Ti 
(Lord).”  In  the  strength,  permanence  and  pride  of  such 
an  assurance  is  rooted  a real  art  spirit,  and  you  behold  its 
flowers  in  these  elaborate  teapoys,  chairs,  screens,  stands, 
tables,  and  everything  that  the  king  of  woods  can  be 
worked  into. 

It  is  the  same  in  Nganking,  the  capital  of  Nganwei, 
with  the  horn  lantern  w’orkers;  once  a lantern  maker, 
always  one.  Hang  a silk  net  over  the  lantern,  and  you 
have  something  opal-soft,  but  light  and  strong.  Think 
of  the  patience  of  artisans  who  work  and  stretch  horn 
in  a moist  heat  until  it  is  pliable  enough  for  these  de- 
signs. It  is  the  same  story  in  Swatow,  among  the  needle 
workers  who  execute  drawn-work;  they  are  the  descend- 
ants of  those  who  have  been  developing  their  art  for 
centuries. 

Or  wander  along  the  Sun  Tau  Lan  or  the  Hin  Chan, 
where  you  may  find  old  turquoise-blue  and  gold  vases  of 
the  Yung  Chin  period  which  bring  five  thousand  dollars. 
Vases  of  the  Ming  dynasty  are  w'orth  as  high  as  ten  thou- 
sand dollars,  and  you  will  find  one  here  if  anywhere.  A 


250 


THE  CHINESE 


pair  of  old  Chinese  large  famille  rose  vases,  enameled 
with  chrysanthemums,  magnolias  and  cherries  of  the 
Kien  Lung  period,  like  these  you  behold,  have  sold  at 
Christie’s  for  four  thousand  dollars.  A pair  of  square 
Kang  He  vases,  tapering  in  shape  with  famille  verte  dec- 
oration on  a black  ground,  has  brought  nineteen  thousand 
dollars;  a pair  of  Ky  Lin  jars,  twenty-nine  hundred  dol- 
lars, and  a pair  of  Kien  Lung  jars  eighty-six  hundred 
dollars  at  Christie’s  in  London,  but  the  Chinese  call  this 
extravagance  on  our  part,  an  affectation  in  view  of  our 
neglect  of  their  present  productions.  The  Manchu  con- 
querors have  inspired  the  production  of  no  porcelain  equal 
to  the  product  of  the  ancient  potteries  of  the  native  Ming 
kings  of  the  fifth  century,  which  answers  to  China’s  Au- 
gustan age  in  art.  The  proportions  of  the  royal  ware 
are  fixed:  base  one-third,  bowl  one-third,  and  neck  one- 
third  of  the  height.  Even  in  these  more  or  less  decadent 
days  nothing  changes  in  China:  the  lapis  lazuli  color  of 
Ming  vases  and  the  cobalt  blue  of  the  Kang  He  period  are 
the  standards  in  judging  the  tones  of  modern  productions. 
Other  vases,  showing  some  ancient  imported  Greek  influ- 
ence perhaps,  are  of  gourd  shape,  with  a ground  of  pow- 
dered blue,  on  which  are  set  circular  panels,  the  scrolls 
being  gold  and  the  subjects  enameled  pylins,  branches  and 
birds.  Some  of  these  unique  vases  bring  as  high  as  one 
thousand  dollars  each. 

The  most  famous  Imperial  pottery  towns  with  a history 
of  one  thousand  years  in  the  art,  are  inland,  in  Kiang-si 
Province,  and  lie  along  the  Kan  River.  Eastward  from 
Poyang  Lake,  about  thirty  miles  up  a deep  valley,  where 
you  would  rather  look  for  sooty  coal,  is  King  Teh  Ching, 
introduced  to  our  verse  by  Longfellow.  The  population 
of  these  pottery  towns  once  ran  as  high  as  one  hundred 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  251 


thousand,  all  engaged  in  firing  the  ping-tu,  or  powdered 
decomposed  granite.  When  twilight  deepens  fast,  you 
will  notice  the  flames  of  five  hundred  kilns  brightening 
into  view  in  the  darkening  valleys.  The  fifty  pound 
bricks  for  the  Great  Wall,  and  the  enormous  yellow  tiles 
for  the  Nanking  Pagoda,  specimens  of  which  you  will  find 
at  the  Metropolitan  Museum,  New  York,  were  fired  here. 
For  miles  along  the  shore  of  Poyang,  the  junks  are  load- 
ing for  ports  three  hundred  miles  away  along  the  great 
Yangtze  River,  there  to  distribute  to  mandarin  and  white 
typan  the  treasures  of  Gold  Medallion ; Blue  and  White 
Willow;  brown  water  kongs  with  raised  blue  panels; 
Nanking  blue  barrel-shaped  garden  seats;  brilliant  White 
Ting,  the  glaze  of  which  you  would  marvel  to  learn  was 
produced  with  the  ashes  of  ferns;  pale  bluish  green  Ju; 
creamy  white,  trout-scale,  crackled  Kien  Yiu;  Tai  cups 
which  are  realistic  water-lilies,  the  handle  being  a green 
sepal;  precious  cerulean  blue  Yu  Kwo  Tien,  whose  tone 
is  the  despair  of  Europe  and  broken  bits  of  which  are 
carried  about  and  set  as  jewels  in  China;  highly  colored 
cinnabar,  green  and  purple-brown  Chun  ware ; paper-thin 
tea-green  and  scarlet  Mandarin  Kuan  work  with  crab- 
claw  pattern;  sea-green  and  gull-gray  Ko  Yau;  Kang  He 
black  vases;  bright  red  Hsuan  Te  with  insects  rilievo; 
Cheng  Hua  ware  with  life-like  figures  of  fowl;  jade 
green  and  gold  Tsang  ware;  and  the  celebrated  beef- 
blood  Ming  pottery,  whose  w’avy  lines  of  red  are  formed 
by  intermittent  drafts  of  air  being  blown  into  the  fur- 
nace as  the  enamel  bakes.  Only  a few  of  the  vases  with 
rouge  de  fer  glaze  and  the  mei  tree  with  red  blooms  as 
motif,  exist;  one  priceless  specimen  being  in  the  Metro- 
politan Museum,  New  York  City. 

You  will  notice  on  old  Chinese  porcelain  merely  the 


252 


THE  CHINESE 


name  of  the  reign.  In  contemporary  output  the  factory 
name  is  fired  as  “ made  at  the  Harmony  Factory,”  “ made 
at  the  Myriad  Peaks  Monastery,”  but  never  the  name  of 
the  artist  as  is  the  Japanese  custom  old  and  new.  How- 
ever, tradition  has  brought  down  the  name  of  the  family 
Lung  as  the  most  wonderful  of  the  potters  of  the  six- 
teenth century.  They  took  to  the  grave  with  them  the 
secret  of  their  inimitable  blood-red  ware.  Something  of 
praise  must  then  be  admitted  of  the  only  race  which  has 
reached  that  artistic  extinction  of  self-consciousness 
where  the  workers  are  willing  to  forego  their  identity. 

Porcelain  is  used  for  the  faqade  of  many  of  the  temples 
of  the  Yangtze  Valley,  and  the  effect  of  the  gorgeous 
panels  and  relieved  figures  in  the  glistening  white  space, 
together  with  the  sun-bathed  colored  eaves,  is  more  like 
the  shimmer  of  jewels  than  anything  our  architecture  has 
produced.  The  Hung  Shek  temple  at  Wuchow  rises 
with  a perfectly  plain  wall  above  colored  balustrades  and 
noble  flights  of  steps,  on  which  large  vases  are  set.  This 
plainness  is  intentional,  to  give  effect  to  the  gorgeous 
tiling  of  the  towers  and  cornices.  The  Chinese  is  a pro- 
founder artist  than  the  Japanese,  as  he  understands  the 
balance  which  exists  between  rich  decoration  and  plain 
surfaces.  The  fagade  of  the  Temple  of  the  Black  God 
in  the  city  of  Chow  Tung  in  Yunnan  is  a solid  gleam  of 
rich  porcelains,  but  the  effect  is  lost  in  the  narrow  street. 
One-half  of  China’s  temples  are  thus  miserably  situated. 

The  famous  cloisonee  is  made  as  follows.  A copper 
vase  is  secured  and  the  design  is  etched  thereon,  thin 
copper  or  gold  wires  being  cemented  on  these  lines.  The 
vase  is  then  fired  to  anneal  the  wires.  Colored  vitreous 
pastes  of  saltpetre,  sandstone,  oxides,  lead  salts  and  rice 
water  are  dexterously  filled  in  the  interstices.  The  vase 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  253 


is  again  baked.  When  cool,  a file  is  applied,  after  which 
the  vase  is  again  fired.  Several  polishes  are  now  applied, 
with  limestone  used  on  the  lathe,  and  a polish  with  char- 
coal follows.  If  gilt  is  to  be  applied,  it  is  now  done  by 
galvanic  process,  after  which  there  is  a final  polishing 
which  reveals  a work  of  enduring  and  enrapturing  iri- 
descence. In  the  firing  of  large  roof  and  wall  tiles  and 
solid  shapes  for  mullions,  sills,  plinths,  lozenged  ventila- 
tor vents,  etc.,  the  potters  are  as  expert  as  any  of  our 
artisans  at  Trenton  or  Liverpool,  Ohio.  Nothing  is 
built  up  from  single  bricks  that  can  possibly  be  fired  in 
one  piece. 

The  coolie  and  the  fisherman  however  still  eat  off  Han- 
kau  iron;  camphor-wood  deck  or  plaintain  leaf.  When 
they,  like  any  other  labor  in  history,  can  afford  to  sit 
before  an  earthenware  plate  and  have  the  wherewithal 
for  renewals  when  it  is  broken,  tliere  may  possibly  not  be 
a Manchu  on  the  Yellow  Throne.  For  it  is  to  be  noticed 
that  when  peasants  are  able  to  buy  crockery  they  gener- 
ally change  their  minds  first  and  purchase  swords  to  mend 
their  grievances,  or  retaliate  upon  those  who  kept  them 
serfs  too  long. 

In  meeting  residents  of  the  South  and  of  the  North,  it 
is  noticeable  that  among  the  former  the  names  are  soft 
and  flowing,  as  compared  with  the  sharp  and  hard  names 
of  the  North.  In  looks  it  is  the  opposite,  the  Southerner 
having  the  high  cheek-bones  and  harder  face,  and  the 
Northerner  having  the  oval  face.  The  Manchu  is  tinc- 
tured with  the  severity  of  name  and  manner  of  the  Mon- 
golian and  Korean,  among  which  latter  people  you  en- 
counter names  like  Pak  Sok.  Compare  the  southern 
Fung  Kwang  Chung  with  Jen  Yuk  Gko,  or  Min  Yin  with 
the  harsh  Hok  Ngon.  The  commonest  family  name  in 


254  the  CHINESE 

China  is  Chang.  It  resembles  the  Smith  family  in 
America. 

In  the  ingrafting  of  American  and  European  inventions 
among  her  industries,  especially  at  Han-kau,  the  Chinese 
find  themselves  without  means  to  name  the  strangers  in 
the  arbitrary  Wenli  or  i^iandarin  written  speech  which 
dates  to  B.  C.  2500.  As  an  instance  the  best  they  could 
do  with  an  incandescent  light  was  to  call  it  “ new  moon- 
shine.” .Wenli  is  the  common  speech  of  the  masses  only 
in  Honan  and  Shan-tung.  As  illustrating  the  slight  dif- 
ferences between  the  pronunciation  of  the  mandarin 
Wenli  and  the  Cantonese,  the  word  loh  in  the  former  is 
sounded  lok  in  the  latter;  and  yu  sha  tsze  in  the 
former  is  yau  sha  isoi  in  the  latter,  which  is  not  as 
great  a difference  perhaps  as  “ fo  yee  ol  ” of  the  Ken- 
tuckian and  “ four  year  old  ” of  the  Yankee.  There  is 
really  only  one  language  in  all  China,  though  so  many 
speak  the  provincial  dialects  that  they  have  gained  an  un- 
warranted reputation  as  separate  languages.  These  dia- 
lects, difficult  both  to  the  foreigner  and  the  Chinese  from 
a remote  part,  have  grown  up  from  the  isolation  of  the 
provinces,  as  a germ  center  propagates  when  not  dis- 
turbed. It  is  not  because  there  has  not  been  sufficient 
pride  in  the  letter,  for  the  Thibet  monasteries  outdo  the 
performance  of  the  Hotel  Rambouillet  in  a fine  frenzy  for 
glossification  and  formula.  Railways  will  have  most  to 
do  with  the  scattering  of  the  dialects  and  will  give  the 
Chinese  that  unification  of  speech  and  resultant  dissemina- 
tion of  idea,  which  have  been  the  main  things  (and  not 
the  lack  of  Christianity  or  inventions)  that  have  kept 
them  from  moving  forward  as  a very  assertive  body  in 
the  world’s  polity. 

The  character  or  picture  system  is  inadequate  for  law 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  255 


or  commercial  writing,  though  it  floods  the  mind  in  their 
poetry  with  beautiful  suggestions  and  with  instant  effect, 
as  compared  with  the  considerable  time  before  the  eye 
can  glance  along  a Latinized  sentence,  for  instance.  Into 
the  spoken  or  provincial  dialects,  especially  in  the  south 
(and  Cantonese  seems  to  be  of  greatest  antiquity  with  its 
soft  musical  sounds  and  flowing  diphthongs  as  com- 
pared with  the  gutturals  of  the  Kansu  dialect  of  the 
North)  have  crept  many  phoneticized  English  words,  and 
English  is  likewise  enriching  herself  with  words  formed 
phonetically  from  the  Chinese  character.  Historically, 
the  Chinese  language,  with  all  its  boasted  conservatism, 
has  already  authority  for  this  intrusion  and  enrichment, 
for  there  are  traces  of  Sanscrit  words  which  were  intro- 
duced by  the  Buddhists.  A neglected  piece  of  Sanscrit 
advice  however  in  fever-stricken  China  is  the  following: 
“ Keep  water  in  copper,  and  expose  it  to  the  sun,  dip  in 
it  seven  times  a bar  of  hot  copper,  and  filter  through  char- 
coal.” On  July  9th,  last,  at  the  parade  of  the  new  Chi- 
nese Volunteer  Corps  along  the  Maloo  at  Shanghai,  it 
was  remarked  that  Colonel  Yu  Ya  Ching  invariably  gave 
the  word  of  command  in  English.  It  is  to  be  noticed  that 
the  Chinese  are  more  anxious  to  learn  English  than  we 
are  to  learn  Chinese.  In  my  experience  in  Hong-Kong 
we  had  a constant  procession  from  the  two  Kwang  Prov- 
inces of  punkah  coolies,  ’rickisha  pullers,  office  boys,  and 
comprador’s  clerks,  none  staying  longer  than  six  months. 
They  were  really  students  of  English.  When  they 
learned  something  of  the  language  while  being  paid  the 
usual  laborer’s  wage  of  five  dollars  a month,  they  re- 
signed suddenly  to  blossom  out  at  twenty  dollars  a month, 
as  consul’s  interpreters,  clerks  to  ship’s  pursers,  and  in 
their  own  Imperial  Customs  or  importing  Hongs.  This 


256 


THE  CHINESE 


interest  in  the  languages  was  not  mutual.  In  twenty 
years  history  of  this  Hong,  with  probably  an  aggregate  of 
three  hundred  staff  employees,  only  one  English  speaking 
clerk  acquired  Chinese,  and  it  was  Portuguese  blood  in 
his  veins  which  stimulated  the  linguistic  interest.  The 
Chinese  are  determined  to  gain  more  from  us  than  we  are 
from  them.  The  telegraph  blanks  in  use  over  China’s 
thirty  thousand  miles  of  wire  are  printed  in  English  and 
Chinese,  and  have  been  excellent  primers  throughout  the 
land  in  disseminating  an  interest  in  that  one  type  of  for- 
eigner, the  credit  for  which  is  due  to  the  ablest  business 
man  who  ever  came  to  China,  the  indefatigable  Irishman, 
Robert  Hart,  the  head  official,  until  his  retirement  re- 
cently, of  the  Imperial  Customs. 

The  dialect,  or  hang-tan,  as  in  every  country,  is  a tone 
play  on  the  written  word,  differing  according  to  locality, 
and  the  tone  differences  are  most  minutely  drawn.  They 
are  not  insurmountable  however,  as  is  the  belief  abroad 
concerning  them  and  can  be  illustrated  by  the  pronouncia- 
tion  of  the  name  of  the  town  in  the  Sunglo  Hills  of  Ngan- 
wei  Province  where  the  best  ink  is  made.  In  the  local 
dialect  it  is  Wei-Chow;  in  Cantonese,  Fy-Chow.  The 
town  on  the  Chang  River  which  distributes  porcelain,  in 
the  local  Kiang-si  dialect  is  called  Kau-Chow ; in  Canton- 
ese it  is  Jau-Chow.  In  the  same  manner,  tea  is  called 
ta  at  Nanking,  and  tai  at  Canton.  The  word  for  a vil- 
lage headman  in  Nganwei  Province  is  pronounced  faipoa; 
in  Kwangtung  Province  it  is  taipan;  in  Singapore  it  is 
towkay.  The  word  for  a tael  called  Hang  at  Shanghai  is 
pronounced  Ian  in  Kansu  Province,  while  the  word  for  the 
ten  cash  copper  piece  called  fun  at  Hong-Kong,  is  pro- 
nounced tun  at  Tientsin.  The  word  mapoo  (jockey)  at 
Seoul  is  pronounced  mafoo  at  Hong-Kong,  and  mahong 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  257 


at  Yunnan.  The  name  of  the  capital  of  the  oldest  prov- 
ince of  China,  is  pronounced  by  the  Shensians  themselves 
Chian,  but  a Kwangtung  man  would  call  it  Tsian. 
The  whisky  distilled  from  rice,  which  in  northern  Shensi 
is  pronounced  somsliazv,  is  called  samslud  in  most  south- 
ern Kwangtung;  som-jce-o  in  Pechili  Province  and  clwm 
chum  on  the  boarders  of  Yunnan  and  Tonquin.  A for- 
eigner, or  literally  a “ foreign  devil,”  is  pronounced  Hung 
Kwei  at  Peking;  Yang  Kwei  in  Kansu  Province  and  Fung 
Kwei  at  Canton,  which  invented  the  term.  A head 
helper,  in  charge  of  a gang,  store  or  pack  train,  is  called 
futau  in  Yunnan  Province  and  fokai  in  Kwangtung  Prov- 
ince. Pai,  which  means  “ white  ” at  Peking,  is  pro- 
nounced Pek  at  Amoy.  The  Goddess  of  Mercy  called 
Kun  Yam  at  Canton  is  pronounced  Kuan  Yin  at  Tien- 
tsin. Taotai  which  means  city  governor  at  Hong- Kong 
is  pronounced  Tu-ti  at  Peking.  In  Alongolia  the  late 
Emperor’s  name  is  pronounced  Kang  Si,  while  at  Peking 
it  is  Kwong  Su.  The  Mongol  word  for  wood  is  mo-don; 
in  Chinese  mu-ton.  Hung,  which  means  “ red  ” at  Pe- 
king is  pronounced  hong  by  the  brilliant  and  independent 
aborigines  of  Yunnan  Province.  The  great  iron  Prov- 
ince is  called  Hupei  by  the  Pekingese  and  Hupeh  by  the 
provincials  themselves.  The  poet  who  wrote  the  Chinese 
Raven  ode,  which  suggested  Poe’s  theme,  is  called  KiYi 
at  Canton  and  Chi  Yi  at  Peking.  The  word  for  river, 
pronounced  kiang  in  the  Yangtze  Provinces  is  called 
giang  in  Y^'unnan.  The  monumental  arches  erected  to 
widows  who  did  not  remarry,  are  called  pailou  at  Peking 
and  pailo  at  Canton.  The  numeral  “ one  ” is  called  ya 
at  Canton  and  ta  at  Peking.  Jen,  which  means  “ men  ” 
throughout  China  proper,  is  pronounced  ren  among  the 
aborigines  of  sequestered  Hainan  Island.  The  Korean 


258 


THE  CHINESE 


Copper  Mine  “ Kapsan  ” is  called  by  the  kindred  Japanese 
“ Kosan.”  The  Chinese  retort  that  the  Occidental  is  not 
free  of  suspicion  of  opaqueness  of  expression  both  in  the 
written  and  spoken  word,  A Chinese  student  in  France 
pointed  out  a hospital  which  bore  the  name  “ Hotel  Dieu 
du  Precieux  Sang  ” and  asked  “ Who  the  blood  was  pre- 
cious to,”  and  a student  in  English  added  his  experience 
by  inquiring  when  it  would  be  “ right  to  write  to  Wright.” 
and  when  “ March  fourth  ” is  a date  or  a command.  To 
show  that  Pidgin-English  has  no  etymological  relation- 
ship it  is  only  necessary  to  give  an  illustration.  Kwai  in 
pure  Chinese  is  “ quick  ” ; in  Pidgin  it  is  “ fightee.” 

A gentleman  is  marked  by  his  aspirates  and  tones. 
How  important  these  are,  can  be  judged  by  the  greatest 
Chinese  dictionary  issued  in  1711,  the  Pei  Wan  Yun  Fu, 
one  hundred  and  thirty  volumes,  which  arranges  the 
words  by  their  pronunciation,  and  which  monument  of 
its  language  China  owes  to  the  efforts  of  her  literary  Em- 
peror, Kang  He.  A curse  and  a compliment  are  differen- 
tiated only  by  the  hiss  of  the  lips.  Koot  means  good; 
shoot  means  evil.  The  same  word  pronounced  in 
the  Doh  tone  has  a vastly  different  meaning  when  the  Soh 
or  Me  tone  is  used.  Ta,  Erh,  San,  are  one,  two, 
three  in  Pekingese  in  Soh  tone,  but  you  would  not 
want  to  be  responsible  for  them  in  Doh  tone.  The 
character  the  Roman  Catholic  missionaries  use  for  God 
is  “Tien  Chu”;  if  you  are  not  careful  to  give  it  the 
proper  lisp,  you  will  say  the  “ Heavenly  Pig.”  When 
you  squeal  yu  in  a shrill  voice  you  say  “ fish  ” ; when 
you  rumble  the  same  word  in  a base  tone  you  say  “ rain.” 
If  you  say  chi  sharply  it  means  “ gas,”  but  if  you  say 
chih  with  a hiss,  it  means  “ red.”  The  same  word 
in  Doh  tone  means  “ man  ” and  in  Soh  tone  a “ disease.” 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  259 


The  reason  a Chinese  school-room  is  as  noisy  as  a boiler 
shop,  is  that  the  requirements  of  the  exact  tone  compel 
the  pupils  to  study  their  lessons  aloud  for  their  own  satis- 
faction. Because  of  the  many  inflections  of  tone  neces- 
sary the  speech  of  a highly  cultivated  Chinese  statesman 
sounds  not  unlike  a soft  song.  It  is  these  finely  drawn 
distinctions  of  speech  which  have  robbed  China  of  orators 
and  thus  kept  the  people  separated.  To  speak  correctly 
requires  a low  tone  and  plenty  of  time,  ill  suited  to  the 
storm  and  strenuousness  of  the  rostrum  of  American  life 
for  instance.  Like  the  Roman,  Chinese  abounds  in  im- 
personal forms  of  address,  and  with  historic  unconcern 
winds  its  cumbrous  course  along.  Not  in  these  garbs 
could  a Pepys  pirouette.  The  Chinese  involved  character 
or  ideogram,  which  is  a built-up  tree,  every  branch  adding 
a condition  to  the  parent  character  is  too  cumbersome  for 
business,  and  some  advocates  of  the  new  learning  are 
calling  even  for  the  phoneticizing  into  Roman  character, 
of  the  Wenli.  For  purposes  of  telegraphy  the  thou- 
sands of  Wenli  ideograph  characters  have  each  a number, 
which  latter  is  transmitted,  and  the  receiver  looks  up  the 
code  to  transcribe  the  message.  There  are  five  thousand 
distinct  characters,  and  four  times  as  many  amended 
synonyms. 

Similar  to  our  abbreviated  writing  in  account  books, 
the  Chinese  shroffs  have  invented  a careless  style  called 
tsao  tsz  or  plant  writing,  which  is  their  nearest  ap- 
proach to  a running  shorthand.  The  characters  are  cer- 
tainly arbitrary  enough  for  any  system  of  grammalogues. 
The  difference  between  the  rapid  commercial  and  the  more 
florid  styles  in  writing  the  character  can  be  at  once  seen  in 
the  word  “ son.”  The  commercial  style  leaves  off  certain 
lines  and  slurs  other  lines;  commercial  ; florid  , 


26o 


THE  CHINESE 


The Hing Shu,  or  Rowinghand,  answers  to  our  unabbrevi- 
ated Spencerian,  and  is  the  pride  of  their  decorative  scroll 
work.  Books  and  newspapers  are  printed  in  the  orthodox 
Kiai  Shu  form  of  character.  The  ancient  characters  also 
find  themselves  too  indefinite  for  expressing  the  abstruse. 
The  same  character  acts  as  noun,  verb,  or  preposition,  ac- 
cording to  its  place  in  the  sentence.  The  indefiniteness  of 
the  present  system  may  be  illustrated  by  the  character  for 
a tree,  which  is  a veritable  picture  of  a banyan  with  two 
hanging  branches  dropping  to  take  root.  The  character 
representing  forest  is  two  of  these  tree  characters  run 
together.  The  character  of  three  peaks,  shan,  JU. 
of  course  is  their  word  for  mountain.  One  bamboo  com- 
mercial tally  cast  down  ^ — represents  the  figure  “ one,” 
and  three  of  them  parallel  represent  “three”  As 

their  system  is  decimal,  two  tallies  crossed  mark  the  first 
halt  or  ten.  The  ten  cash  coin,  with  this  cross  of  the 
Christians  upon  it,  was  accordingly  despised  and  shown 
contumely  by  the  Boxers  in  1900.  Earth  is  represented 
as  stretching  out  flat  beneath  a standing  man  j-  . 
Water  is  illustrated  by  sprays  arising  from  an  aperture. 
The  character  is  the  representation  of  a Chi- 

nese gable  with  heavy  eaves  and  ridge  tile.  Therefore 
it  stands  for  the  roof  of  a yamen  or  academy  near  a 
pagoda,  where  the  schools  are  held.  The  character  ^ 
is  the  picture  of  a child  with  arms  outstretched  and 
wearing  the  large  grass  sun-hat  made  in  Hupeh.  Put- 
ting the  two  characters  together  thus  therefore  rep- 
resents the  familiar  scene  of  a boy  sheltered  under  the 
academic  roof,  studying  the  classics,  and  in  the  lan- 
guage has  become  the  arbitrary  for  the  word  “ litera- 
ture.” The  word  son  (scatter)  is  the  exact  picture 
of  a helmeted  soldier  chasing  a fugitive  who  has  thrown 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  261 


away  his  hat,  thus  f/i.  The  character  for  heaven, 
Tien,  re^Dresents  two  roofs,  one  of  the  stars  and  one  of 
the  sky,  supported  by  two  props  or  trees  '*=5?"  . The 
character  for  rice  (mi)  represents  a man  with  his  arms 
outstretched,  standing  in  a field  on  which  scattered  grain 
lies,  thus  JD  . The  character  for  God  (Shang  Ti) 
represents  a kneeling  mortal  in  the  act  of  making  an 
offering  before  a Being  who  hovers  over  the  two  roofs 
of  sky  and  stars,  which  latter  is  supported  with  the 
trunk  and  branches  of  a banyan,  thus  The  char- 

acter is  woman;  place  her  under  her  roof  tree,  and 
the  arbitrary  represents  domestic  felicity,  or  the  word 
“ satisfaction,”  . 

The  Chinese  language  accordingly  can  be  dissected  into 
roots  just  as  ours  can.  Punctuation  is  considered  inele- 
gant, but  I have  seen  shroffs  in  Hong-Kong  venture  upon 
the  paragraph.  The  new  characters  which  China  calls 
for,  must  come.  When  they  do,  the  old  characters,  which 
are  the  most  elaborate  and  beautiful  that  language  ever 
designed  for  its  abode,  must  pass  to  the  select  possession 
of  priests  and  literati.  It  should  certainly  always  be 
taught  in  the  universities  and  monasteries,  just  as  our 
classic  the  Greek  is  preserved  from  extinction,  and  it  al- 
ways has  a great  mission  of  culture  in  interpreting  those 
proud  riches  of  China,  the  works  of  her  unrivaled  phil- 
osophers. There  are  on  the  other  hand,  moderns  in  other 
respects,  who  declare  that  the  Chinese  character  will  take 
upon  itself  both  definiteness  and  elasticity,  and  be  able  to 
grow  as  lustily  as  has  the  Saxon  language,  which,  with  its 
borrowed  Roman  characters,  has  fed  on  every  speech,  dead 
and  living.  While  the  Wenli  character  means  the  same 
thing  all  over  China,  and  while  the  cultured  Japanese  can 
read  any  Chinese  book,  the  Japanese  use  the  character  so 


262 


THE  CHINESE 


differently  that  the  Chinese  can  not  read  a Japanese  book 
or  paper.  The  Japanese  have  long  lapsed  from  the  artistic 
freedom  of  stroke  in  painting  the  character,  which  with 
them  is  a stiffer  and  more  squat  ideogram. 

As  soon  as  a Chinese  boy  enters  the  school-room  he 
bows  in  reverence  before  the  tablet  that  bears  the  name 
of  Confucius.  Decoratively,  tablets  in  that  land  take 
the  place  of  busts  and  statuary  among  ourselves.  In  the 
memorial  tablet  is  said  to  dwell  one  of  the  three  souls  of 
a man,  the  other  two  with  his  death  going,  one  to  heaven 
(Tien),  and  the  other  remaining  in  the  grave  with  the 
sacred  body. 

The  Uigur  writing  of  the  Manchus  is  decidedly  grace- 
ful in  occidental  taste.  It  has  only  been  preserved  to 
translate  Chinese  books,  as  the  Manchus  have  lost  any 
literature  Avhich  they  once  may  have  had.  The  con- 
stricted literary  radius  of  the  Manchu  can  be  compre- 
hended at  a glance  when  we  say  that  the  total  library  of 
these  translations  amounts  to  only  three  hundred  books. 
There  are  eighteen  consonants  and  eight  vowels.  The 
alphabet  is  syllabic  in  distinction  to  the  monosyllabic 
Chinese.  As  a spoken  language,  Manchu  is  retreating 
to  the  fastnesses  of  Manchuria,  and  the  intruding  Jap- 
anese purposes  to  put  a quietus  upon  it  there.  The  de- 
cadence of  the  Manchu  in  this  respect  exhibits  the 
interesting  fact  that  this  is  the  only  time  in  history  where 
a conqueror  has  not  flourished  a sword  in  one  hand  and 
a pen  in  the  other.  This  conqueror  put  both  hands  to 
his  two-edged  sword  and,  perforce,  in  language  was  con- 
quered by  the  vanquished  in  arms.  As  compared  with 
the  Chinese  the  Manchu  is  the  more  forcible  but  less 
elegant  language. 

The  kindred  Mongolian  holds  its  own,  especially  in  the 


CO^VHICMT.  8T  UNOERWOOO  A UNDEA>«000,  N r. 

Oldest  pagoda  now  standing  in  China.  The  pentagonal  Tien  Fun 
Tall  at  Xingpo.  800  A.D.  Note  the  bold  gable  Che- 
Kiang  style,  of  the  residence  on  the  right. 


Spirited  and  delicate  carving  and  tile  work,  Temple  of  Cho  Shing, 
Canton,  South  China. 


'reni|)lc  of  I'ive  (ienii.  Canton,  South  China. 

Note  spirited  tretitinent  of  draperies  of  two  (ienii  on  right  hv  Chinese 
scul])tors,  who  ,sur])ass  even  our  St.  (laudcns  in  this  re- 
spect. Their  tre.'itinent  of  the  facial  expression, 
not  being  .according  to  our  canons, 
ctinnot  he  criticised. 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  263 


spoken  language  which  has  no  dialect,  for  a Mongol  of 
Khotan  can  understand  one  from  Koren.  The  language 
is  also  alphabetic  in  distinction  to  the  Chinese  arbitrary 
character;  it  abounds  in  the  use  of  involved  adverbial 
phrases,  wound  round  and  round,  like  a cocoon’s  thread, 
in  the  sentence.  It  is  interesting  to  remember  that  this 
was  the  writing  used  by  the  conqueror,  Genghis  Khan; 
that  is  to  say,  it  was  used  by  those  who  wrote  for  him. 
In  literature  and  religion,  the  Mongols  are  more  closely 
allied  to  the  Thibetans  than  any  other  of  the  Chinese 
divisions,  but  the  literature,  like  the  Manchu,  is  mainly 
translations  of  Buddhist  books. 

Like  our  own  shorthand  system,  the  vowels  of  the 
Mongol  writing,  with  two  exceptions,  must  be  guessed. 
Thus,  the  letters  N.  R.  may  represent  the  words  pro- 
nounced nara  (sun),  or  ncrc  (name).  Curiously,  some 
Mongol  sentences  are  our  e.xact  words,  as  “ eat  I ” 
is  their  expression  for  “ I eat.”  The  Mongolian  has  no 
right  and  left  hand,  but  rather  a “ west  ” and  “ east  ” 
hand.  There  is  one  sacred  spot  on  the  Selenga  River  on 
the  borders  of  Siberia  and  Mongolia  where  two  mission- 
aries of  the  London  Mission,  Stallybrass  and  Swan,  lived 
in  what  was  then  a terrible  exile  from  1818  to  1841,  and 
translated  our  whole  Bible  into  Mongolian  characters, 
and  when  the  battlefields  of  Genghis,  Kuropatkin  and 
Kuroki  are  forgotten,  the  place  where  these  two  men 
worked  will  still  be  drawing  the  admiring  feet  of  the 
world  to  see  a Mongolia  redeemed. 

There  is  a censorship  in  China,  the  government  im- 
primatur being  two  dragons  encircling  the  name  of  the 
book.  One  of  the  new  great  Pus  (Boards)  is  named 
‘ Colonies  and  Censorship.”  The  government  is  finding 
that  the  growing  press  is  assertive  in  the  progress  of 


264 


THE  CHINESE 


China.  For  example,  where  four  years  ago  Tientsin 
published  four  native  papers  or  Paos,  there  are  now 
twenty-three  sheets,  and  this  is  an  illustration  of  what 
is  going  on  beyond  the  treaty  ports.  Hong-Kong’s 
splendid  Chinese  sheet  is  the  Wah  Tsz  Po.  Even  in 
Lhassa  a paper  has  been  started  by  the  head  Chinese 
resident,  Tschang  Ying.  I asked  my  Chinese  humorist 
if  he  expected  that  the  morals  of  his  country  would  be 
improved  when  newspapers  shall  have  illumed  the  whole 
land,  and  he  replied : “ This  far  at  least,  we  shall  be  harder 
to  fool.”  China’s  organization  fulfils  many  of  the  his- 
toric requirements  of  modern  political  power.  Over 
manners,  laws  and  religion,  she  long  ago  established  a 
centralized  authority.  It  remains,  if  her  civilization  is 
to  be  peimanent,  that  a free  press  shall  arise  and  try 
by  public  opinion  the  strength  of  every  prop  of  the 
State,  rather  than  to  permit  an  enemy  to  do  so  by  arms. 
The  Kmg  Pao,  or  Peking  Gazette,  the  official  organ, 
has  long  generously  thrown  open  to  foreigners  intimate 
information  concerning  the  government  of  the  realm. 
You  will  find  copies  of  the  monthly  issues,  bound  in  yel- 
low, lying  about  any  taotai’s  yamen.  The  censorship 
covers  the  remarkable  privilege  of  intimately  censuring 
the  Emperor  on  his  expenditures.  In  times  of  famine 
this  board  has  used  its  influence  for  the  people,  inducing 
the  throne  to  curtail  park  extensions  and  expenditures 
for  luxury  and  ceremony. 

The  Chinese  call  what  answers  to  our  Elzevir  and 
pocket  editions,  a “ sleeve  edition,”  the  sleeve  in  that 
country  serving  for  both  pocket  and  basket.  The  stu- 
dents at  the  triennial  examinations  are  searched  so  that 
'they  may  not  carry  in  these  sleeve  editions  or  cribs. 
There  is  no  copyright  protection  for  authors.  At  present 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  265 


one  person  in  one  hundred  is  reached  by  their  press. 
Opinion  is  not  vitalized  for  quick  and  concerted  action 
until  the  proportion  is  one  in  ten,  as  in  Europe.  America, 
of  course,  leads  with  a proportion  of  one  in  four. 

Where  we  place  on  the  street  corners  boxes  bearing 
the  sign : “ Throw  your  papers  in  here  for  the  Hos- 
pital,” the  Chinese  have  similar  receptacles  with  the 
words  “ King  Sik  Tsze  Chi,”  ” Reverence  the  Written 
Word,  for  it  is  Holy.”  Their  religion  teaches  that 
words  never  die,  and  prescribes  as  an  offering  to  the 
informing  Spirit  of  Light,  the  burning  of  the  printed 
Truth,  which,  after  all,  is  only  loaned  to  mortals,  and 
should  be  constantly  clarified  after  it  has  gathered  the 
soil  and  dross  of  the  earth.  It  is  considered  a pious 
work,  even  at  the  Europeanized  treaty  ports,  for  natives 
to  gather  every  scrap  of  newspaper  and  take  it  to  the 
monastery  to  be  consigned  to  the  alembic  of  the  sacred 
flames.  It  is  quite  possible  that  this  bull  was  promul- 
gated by  the  astute  priests  of  Hwang  Te’s  reign,  in  the 
third  century,  B.  C.,  in  order  to  bring  all  books  to  the 
monastery  for  hiding,  when  that  most  hated  of  Chinese 
monarchs  had  his  prime  minister,  Le  Sze,  issue  with 
a will  the  infamous  “ Edict  for  the  Burning  of  the 
Books,”  the  insane  design  being  to  date  history  from  the 
Tsin  dynasty. 

Chinese  literature  is  a mine  of  rare  jewels.  An  ad- 
dress to  a Manchu  prince  is  embroidered  in  blue  and 
red  characters  on  a banner  of  yellow  silk.  Attributes  of 
the  Diety  are  accorded  him : “ Your  Majesty’s  quicken- 

ing influence!  in  thy  hands  are  the  jeweled  greetings 
from  a king’s  palace;  on  this  happy  day  of  the  second 
month  the  wheels  of  your  princely  chariot  are  stayed; 
you  come  as  a glorious  cloud  and  as  a downpour  of 


266 


THE  CHINESE 


timely  rain;  your  banners  descend  from  Heaven  and  the 
longings  of  your  people  are  fulfilled.  As  your  escort 
enters  the  walls,  lol  at  every  door  the  shouts  of  the 
children  arise.  Oh,  King’s  Son,  your  coming  swells  the 
rice  and  fattens  the  meat.”  All  this  exalted  conception 
and  flowery  expression  is  turned  to  ridicule  by  the  fa- 
cetiousness of  the  closing  paragraph:  “Dated  on  a 

lucky  day  of  the  second  month.” 

Another  petition  begins:  “ For  the  jewel  glance  of  a 

mandarin.”  You  can  get  some  of  these  interesting 
pamphlets  among  the  book-shops  on  Liu  Li  Chang  Street, 
Peking. 

When  a Chinese  writer  wishes  to  express  that  the 
wealthy  parent  of  the  heroine  has  set  his  affairs  in  order 
before  dying  in  her  favor,  his  idiom  is : “ He  has  settled 
his  plums.”  “ To  have  plucked  the  kwei  (cassia) 
flower,”  signifies  gaining  the  Master’s  degree  at  the 
triennial  examinations.  Their  idiom  for  “ Let  there  be 
no  backsliding  ” is : “ Let  there  be  no  absorption  of 
sweat.”  A runaway  wife  is  said  by  Liu  Chia  Chu  to 
“ carry  her  guitar  to  another  door.”  When  you  wish  to 
say  you  have  secured  a vindication  you  express  it : “ My 
adversary  has  been  forced  to  paint  my  front  door.”  When 
a great  man  dies  they  say : “ A corner  of  the  city  w'all  has 
fallen.”  When  a coolie  wishes  to  express  his  utter  de- 
testation of  the  slow  movements  of  another,  he  hurls  out 
the  following:  “Thou  egg  of  a turtle,  dost  thou  dare 

to  race  with  a leopard.”  They  do  not  speak  of  the  port 
or  starboard  sides  of  a boat,  but  of  the  north,  south,  east 
or  west  sides,  so  that  in  all  admiralty  cases,  the  essential 
thing  is  to  ascertain  the  course  which  was  laid. 

On  friendship  they  have  this  parable.  Shun,  once 
wealthy  and  famous,  lost  land  and  health,  whereupon 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  267 


every  single  friend  since  Ins  boyhood  turned  upon  him 
in  calumny  and  cruelty,  like  vultures  eager  to  hurry  death. 
Is  therefore  mankind  incapable  of  honor,  and  might  a 
brave  man  better  have  a wallowing  sow  for  a friend? 
No,  Shun  was  a blind  fool  in  his  prosperity  and  youth; 
his  friends  were  always  vultures  in  disguise,  and  their 
presence  kept  from  him  those  who  would  have  been  real 
friends  in  admiration  of  his  mind  and  character.  Know 
that  there  are  those  who,  when  hungry,  crawl,  and  when 
fed,  take  to  their  wings,  and  remember,  also,  that  when 
the  tree  falls,  the  monkeys  flee.  A wealthy  man,  and 
indeed  a man  of  any  estate,  never  can  know  friendship, 
and  should  justly  doubt  the  depth  of  every  acquaintance. 
Friendship  is  alone  founded  in  adversity,  for  poverty  is 
the  test  of  disinterestedness,  as  the  lamp  is  the  proof  of 
the  ruby.  When  Tien  (God)  gives  thee  poverty.  He 
too  will  give  thee  a true  friend,  and  if  thou  wouldst  have 
a friend,  famous  or  rich  man,  thou  must  invite  or  simu- 
late poverty,  sorrow  and  pain  in  the  finding  of  him. 
Piteous  is  that  land  where  there  is  not  the  compulsory 
charities  of  the  clan,  for  the  law  is  better  than  the  heart 
of  man.  Did  not  Confucius  say  in  the  Lun  Yu,  “ Have 
no  friend  unlike  your  heart  of  hearts.” 

Regarding  the  virtuous,  Confucians  poetically  say: 
“ Devils  once  attacked  a good  man,  but  the  tips  of  their 
spears  turned  into  flowers.” 

The  following  is  a parable  of  the  folly  of  a policy  of 
injustice.  A water-buffalo  looked  upon  an  ant  and  de- 
spised it;  blew  upon  it;  grunted  at  it;  vilified  its  ances- 
tors and  tablets,  boasted  to  other  buffaloes  of  his  hate, 
and  in  supreme  insolence,  made  it  the  center  of  his 
manure  heap.  The  buffalo  laid  down  to  sleep  (as  help- 
less, you  will  note,  as  the  ant  in  his  needs)  in  venomous 


268 


THE  CHINESE 


satisfaction  of  having  extinguished  the  very  memory  of 
self-respect  in  the  soul  of  the  ant.  Fortified  with  the 
poison  of  the  buffalo’s  own  manure,  the  ant  crawled 
forth  and  stung  the  buffalo  in  one  eye,  and  on  the  blind 
side  of  the  ridiculous  brute,  for  ever  evades  and  torments 
his  impotent  fury,  to  the  glory  of  the  gods  and  the 
vindication  of  the  truth. 

A cynic  was  asked : “ How  is  it  that  every  youth  is  a 
hero  and  flaunts  a bribe,  and  every  elder  a villain  who 
can  be  bribed,  first  with  not  less  than  a thousand  taels,  and 
afterward  with  a tiao  string.  Your  venal  elders  are 
your  former  heroes.  Pale  Huan,  the  youth,  finds  that  his 
honorability  has  been  his  downfall.  His  self-respecting 
poverty  throughout  his  youth  invited  the  persecution  of 
those  envious  of  his  shining  independence  of  character. 
He  decides  at  last,  as  earth’s  responsibilities  grow  on  him, 
to  suffer  no  more  and  to  commit  no  more  the  compulsory 
petty  sins  of  poverty  in  order  to  live.  He  thereupon 
commits  the  one  great  sin  of  the  rich  and  takes  Shan’s 
bribe.  Oppressed  before,  as  conscience  dies,  he  soon 
oppressor  grows,  all  through  the  law  of  self-preserva- 
tion, which,  in  the  end,  banishes  true  religion  in  a wicked 
world.”  Again : “ There  are  some  so  bad  that  their 

sins  pickle  and  confirm  them  in  evil  instead  of  rotting 
them.” 

Another  cynic  remarks,  “ Some  people  cry  over  graves 
only  to  make  the  grass  of  forgetfulness  grow  the 
quicker.”  And  again,  “ There  is  no  one  who  will  not 
smile  to  the  tickle  of  a bribe,  and  do  not  conclude  that  it 
requires  long  feathers  to  do  the  tickling;  mankind  holds 
itself  very  cheap.” 

A bonze  asks,  “ Of  what  avail  to  scold  a brother  like 
brass,  and  pray  to  Buddh  like  silver?  ” 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  269 


Epigrams  are  attributed  to  busy  nations,  but  they  hap- 
pen also  to  be  the  favorite  form  of  crystallizing  the 
wisdom  of  the  race  which  enjoys  the  most  leisure. 
“ Tact,”  say  they,  “ is  the  discounting  of  principle  in  the 
mart  of  expediency.”  ” Success  is  the  greatest  good  to 
the  smallest  number.”  “ When  does  a statesman  de- 
scend to  be  a political  trimmer?  ” “ When  he  takes  his 

flag  from  the  poor,  but  his  wheels  from  the  rich.”  “ The 
farmer  tills  the  paddy  field,  but  the  mandarin  tills  the 
people.”  The  maxims  of  Confucius  are  terse  epigrams. 
How  much  this  sage  has  influenced  the  morals  of  Europe 
has  not  been  fully  considered.  The  authorship  has  not 
been  credited,  but  many  a sermon  and  essay  have  drawn 
their  inspiring  fire  or  human  pathos  from  the  “ Five 
Classics  ” of  the  Orient.  The  consciousness  of  inspira- 
tion, present  in  all  great  teachers,  was  not  unmarked  in 
Confucius.  At  fifty-five  years  of  age,  when  driven  to 
the  wilds  of  Wei,  he  declared;  “If  it  is  Heaven’s  will 
to  reserve  me  to  teach  this  truth  on  the  earth,  the  mur- 
derous persecutions  of  these  evil  men  of  Kwang  will  do 
nothing  to  me.”  Wonderful  that  on  the  same  day,  Ezra, 
the  prophet  of  the  true  God,  who  had  journeyed  from 
Babylon,  stood  amid  the  ruins  of  Jerusalem  and  cried 
also  of  the  Great  Help : “ Our  God  hath  not  forsaken 

us  in  our  bondage,  but  hath  given  us  a wall  in  Judah.” 
A king  (Wu  Wang),  when  asked  to  substantiate  his  con- 
fidence of  victory  against  an  enemy  numbering  ten  thou- 
sand, replied : “ Because  they  have  ten  thousand  hearts, 
whereas  my  army  has  but  one  heart.” 

The  most  eminent  of  the  Chinese  characteristics  is 
displayed  in  the  following  conversation.  “ Shun  was 
very  great  in  his  boldness  to  cut  the  knot,”  said  a soldier. 
“ Shao  was  great  in  his  patience  to  untie  the  knot,”  said 


270 


THE  CHINESE 


a bonze.  “ Therefore  Shao  was  the  greater  in  genius,” 
added  a philosopher. 

A Chinese  satirist  rails  at  those  who  write  lady-like 
lyrics  with  a pot  of  perfume  on  the  table,  and  at  those 
who  spend  time  in  perfecting  the  splendid  sweep  of  the 
picturesque  Hing  Shu  characters  which  are  painted  on 
large  motto  sheets.  He  retires  to  his  Epicurean  con- 
fession, “The  enjoyment  of  ease  is  my  chief  concern; 
I have  lived  for  Myself.” 

Another  indolent  poet,  who  happens  to  earn  the  larger 
portion  of  his  bread  by  occupying  a menial  position  in  a 
mandaria’s  household,  exclaims : “ I would  hie  from 

office  cares;  by  the  brooklet  I would  lie,  catch  the  finny 
tribes  with  snares,  read  my  books  and  dream  and  think, 
past  to  present  I would  link.” 

The  proverb  of  the  laziest  man  in  China  is : “ It  is 

easier  to  know  how  to  do  a thing  than  to  do  it.”  A mat- 
ter-of-fact man,  a forerunner  of  the  new  Hok  Tong 
scholars,  said,  “To  see  it  once  is  better  than  to  read 
about  it  a thousand  times.” 

Regarding  jealousy  they  say:  “ It  is  easy  for  two  of 

a guild  to  hate,”  and  “ Nine  women  out  of  ten  are 
jealous.”  “ Don’t  bend  the  mulberry  when  it  is  old,” 
corresponds  to  our  saw  not  to  teach  an  old  dog  new 
tricks.  On  games  of  chance  “ The  wanning  tip  is  to  stay 
away  from  the  gaming-table.”  For  our  in  vino  Ver- 
itas, they  have  “ samschu  is  the  arch-thief  of  secrets, 
its  bubble  is  a woman’s  smile.”  A cynic  rails : “ Put 

not  our  Holy  Books  in  the  hands  of  a man  until  he  has 
made  his  competence,  for  conscience  keeps  men  poor 
and  the  poverty  of  the  virtuous  is  the  opportunity  of  the 
unjust  oppressor.”  When  a girl  has  lost  her  affianced 
their  idiom  is ; “ She  has  spilt  her  tea.”  “ To  have  no 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  271 


ink  in  one’s  stomach  ” is  their  expression  for  lack  of 
literary  ability.  On  deceit:  “ The  lips  of  Buddh,  but  the 
teeth  of  a snake.”  Equivalent  to  the  Greek  hoi  polloi 
and  our  “ the  masses  ” is  their  expression,  ” the  myriad 
names,”  which  shows  that  China  has  always  been  con- 
scious of  her  vast  population.  A cynic,  but  withal  a 
virtuous  man,  declares  ” There  are  only  two  true  things, 
God  in  Heaven  and  an  honest  dollar  on  earth,”  and  of  a 
gossiping  wife,  “ If  a chattering  bird  be  not  placed  in 
the  mouth,  vexation  will  not  sit  between  the  eyebrows.” 
A Buddhist  cynic  answers  a Taoist : “ The  final  proof 

that  men  are  not  gods  is  that  a poor  man,  sudd^ly  raised, 
to  a position  of  wealth,  immediately  becomes  as  oppres- 
sive of  the  poor  as  the  rich  class  which  previously  he 
criticized ; therefore  the  arm  of  evil  is  gold,  but  the  seed 
of  it  is  in  man’s  heart.”  Both  as  a metaphor  and  as  a 
moral,  the  following  Mongolian  maxim  is  good  enough 
for  any  people : “ Cast  from  thy  heart  the  dog,  hog 

and  serpent,  for  they  are  the  incarnations  of  lust,  greed 
and  malice.” 

On  ability,  they  say : “ The  world  is  unsafe  when  it  has 
more  genius  than  virtue.”  On  ambition : “ Climb  the 
pole  higher  to  find  how  much  thinner  it  is.”  On  truth : 
“ If  you  tell  me  a lie  you  must  consider  me  your  enemy 
and  that  you  are  acting  under  the  rule  of  self-preserva- 
tion, for  the  bosom  of  a true  friend  is  the  mirror  of  one’s 
self.”  On  scandal : “ A lie  is  the  branch  mirrored  on 

the  surface,  but  beneath  how  deep  the  well  of  true  water.” 
Where  we  admonish  a student  to  grind  or  work,  they 
express  themselves : “ ]\Iay  you  ever  perpetuate  the  fra- 
grance of  books  in  your  ancestral  home.”  Concerning 
charity  they  say,  “ Benevolence  being  of  the  heart,  no 
rule  can  be  set  for  its  acts,”  and  “ You  can  not  call  a deed 


2/2 


THE  CHINESE 


kind  if  it  is  done  in  the  hope  of  recompense.”  On  ex- 
aggeration, “ Paint  a snake  and  add  legs.”  They  turn 
the  flame  of  scorn  on  the  soldiers  of  the  old  regime : 
“Your  valor  is  at  a chicken’s  neck.”  On  appearances: 
“Antics  are  not  always  vivacity  as  the  fish  on  the  hook 
can  say,”  and  “ A rat  may  smile,  but  it  is  not  ivory.”  On 
the  schoolmaster’s  rod : “ The  cudgel  is  the  best  pol- 
isher.” On  a wife : “ Only  her  husband  speaks  of  a 

virtuous  woman,  but  the  name  of  an  evil  woman  grates 
on  all  men’s  teeth.”  One  who  is  not  a gentleman  they 
say  “ lacks  the  tenth  stroke  of  the  lacquer  brush.”  The 
inability  f)f  a man  to  keep  a secret  they  express  in  the 
Three  States  Classic  as  follows:  “If  you  do  not 

want  anybody  to  know  it,  do  not  even  do  it.”  On  satire : 
“ His  was  a golden  pen  that  rayed  the  shafts  of  truth.” 

A philosopher  says : “ The  world  is  about  equally 

divided  between  good  and  bad  people;  in  the  good  is  a 
small  proportion  of  bad ; in  the  bad  is  a small  proportion 
of  good.  This  balance  of  virtue  and  evil  is  so  perfect 
that  it  requires  the  nicest  adjustment  of  the  individual  to 
adapt  himself  to  his  environment,  and  yet  remain  loyal 
to  his  class;  in  fact,  our  civilization  contemplates  the 
direction  of  the  clan  more  than  the  man,  and  we  have  at 
least  evolved  as  a national  virtue,  the  humility  of  the 
individual.”  Their  most  cynical  saying  is : “ The  cre- 

ator is  like  a cruel  sculptor;  he  fashions  man  the  statue; 
he  tires  of  it  and  chips  it  day  by  day  with  persecutions; 
then  petulant,  he  smashes  it  at  last  into  dust.” 

Their  idiom  for  spending  an  afternoon  is  to  say,  “ I 
ate  an  afternoon  there.” 

A poet  who  was  passing,  after  enjoying  the  view,  called 
to  thank  the  owner  of  many  acres.  “ But  I have  not 
given  them  to  you.”  “ You  have  done  better;  you  give 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  273 


me  the  pleasure  of  viewing  the  scenery,  without  my  be- 
ing under  the  burden  of  paying  the  taxes  on  it.  As  you 
pay  the  taxes  for  my  view,  I must  thank  you.” 

A certain  Jesuitical  doctrine  regarding  the  end  justi- 
fying the  means,  a Chinese  philosopher  refutes  as  fol- 
lows: “If  Chang  steals  Wong’s  fortune  and  uses  it 

all  in  charity,  what  credit  is  to  Chang?  None.  The 
credit  will  be  laid  to  Wong  by  the  god  of  Restoration, 
and  Chang  must  answer  for  sacrilege  to  the  god  of  Op- 
portunity.” And  again,  “If  Kwok  commits  but  one  sin 
by  killing  Li’s  child  in  envy,  but  performs  ten  thousand 
charities  with  his  wealth,  is  there  any  tally  for  Kwok? 
None.  He  answers  to  two  gods;  he  tries  to  deceive  the 
god  of  Vengeance  with  the  property  of  the  god  of  Bene- 
factions.” The  Chinese  throughout  their  literature  and 
conversation  take  the  keenest  interest  in  the  morals  of 
wealth,  and  thus  predate  the  twentieth  century  in 
America.  In  their  action  with  the  rich  in  times  of 
famine,  they  have  put  in  practice  the  principle  of  our  sug- 
gested income  and  prevailing  death  taxes,  the  confisca- 
tory principle  being  operative  above  a certain  figure. 
Wealth  over  a certain  number  of  millions  is  confiscated 
for  three  purposes,  the  relief  of  the  poor  in  famine, 
the  extension  of  education  and  the  larger  national  exigen- 
cies such  as  dikes  and  afforestation.  The  ground  taken 
is  that  the  law  must  have  been  evaded,  as  no  individual 
could  honestly  secure  a fortune  which  overtopped  the 
State  itself.  The  government  on  its  own  part  steps  into 
the  breach,  and  for  this  it  has  not  received  due  credit, 
by  remitting  to  the  people  in  times  of  stress,  and  emigra- 
tion to  new  districts,  the  land  taxes  for  one  or  two  years. 

Examples  of  Chinese  proverbs  are : “ Opportunities 

come  in  cycles,  like  meteors.  “ Between  the  mulberries. 


THE  CHINESE 


274 

plant  beans,  for  two  things  can  not  fail.”  “ The  mouth 
of  a dumb  man  and  the  look  of  a fool,  make  a ruler,  for 
the  first  outwits  his  inferiors  and  the  latter  his  superiors.” 
“ A child’s  slap  on  a plow-buffalo’s  ear,  and  a hint  to 
a wise  man,  are  sufficient.”  “ Shave  Chang  every  day, 
but  skin  his  buffalo  once.”  “ Those  who  chase  kites,  fall 
over  straws.”  The  Kan  Ying  Pien  homily  says: 
“ Happiness  and  trouble  stand  at  every  one’s  gate ; yours 
is  the  choice  which  you  will  invite  in.” 

The  very  constitution  of  the  Chinese  written  charac- 
ter has  guided  them  to  think  and  express  themselves 
poetically.  The  people  along  the  Yangtze  call  their 
great  river  “ The  Son  of  the  Sea  ” because  the  tides  flow 
upon  it.  A vast  number  of  people  in  the  eastern  section 
never  call  their  land  anything  else  than  Sze  Hai,  “ The 
country  of  the  four  seas.”  Korea  is  called  Chaosien,  the 
“ Dewy  morning  land.”  Shanghai  interpreted  is  “ Near- 
ing the  sea,”  and  Hong-Kong  is  “ Fragrant  streams,”  be- 
cause of  the  damp  earth  and  vegetable  odors  brought  out 
by  the  equatorial  storms  which  suddenly  leap  with  wild 
white  manes  from  the  hills  in  August.  Lhasa  is  “ God’s 
Ground.”  Canton  is  “ The  broad  city,”  and  Ningpo, 
within  sight  of  the  great  bore  of  Hang-chow  Bay,  means 
“ Beautiful  wave  city.”  China  also  has  her  golden  gate 
port,  for  Quemoy  Island  at  the  entrance  to  Amoy  literally 
is  “ Golden  Plarbor.”  The  names  of  the  provinces  are 
similarly  poetic:  Shan-tung  is  “East  of  the  hills”; 

Fu-kien  means  “ Happily  established  ” ; Shansi,  “ West  of 
the  hills.”  Shensi,  “Western  defiles.”  Hupeh,  “North 
of  the  lakes.”  Szcchuen,  “ Four  streams.”  The  oldest 
known  to  us,  Kwangtung,  means  the  “ Broad  east.” 
Yunnan  is  “ South  of  the  cloudy  mountains  ” of  Thibet. 
Kansu,  where  the  conquered  Mohammedans  dwell  among 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  275 


the  sesamum  oil  trees,  is  satirically  named  “ Voluntary 
reverence.” 

The  names  of  popular  brands  of  tea  are  bestowed  with 
literary  taste:  “Autumn  Dew,”  “Pearl  Elowcr,” 

“ Lotus  Heart,”  etc.  Even  a potato  is  an  “ earth  egg.” 
The  almonds  of  Shensi  Province  are  an  abundant  source 
of  food,  and  it  is  beautifully  suggestive  to  see  the  many 
restaurants  all  over  the  land  with  signs  out  bearing  the 
legend,  “ The  Almond  Flower.”  Where  we  would  say 
“ May  you  flourish  like  the  green  bay  tree,”  the  Chinese 
idiom  is  “ May  you  be  as  full  as  a peony,”  for  that  flower 
represents  wealth  in  their  figure  of  speech. 

The  ming  or  given  name  of  girls  is  often  taken 
from  flowers,  as  “Jasmine”  Chung;  “Orchis”  Choy, 
etc.,  and  boys  have  names  such  as  “ *,-oon*shining  ” 
Cheng;  “Olive  Bud”  Fong;  “Temple  Steps”  Shun;  or 
“ Pagoda  of  Letters  ” Yung.  Sometimes  the  family  or 
sitig  names  are  also  taken  from  nature,  as  Yuen  Chuen, 
“ Sweet  Spring.”  A late  ambassador  to  America  who 
was  educated  at  Yale,  would  perforce  be  called  in  our 
produce  exchange,  if  his  name  were  translated,  “Mr. 
Millet,”  and  the  most  progressive  viceroy.  Yuan  Shi  K’ai 
is  literally  “ Mr.  Duck.” 

Where  our  statesmen  refer  to  the  olive  branch  of 
peace,  they  phrase  it  “ may  the  bamboo  wave.”  The 
Chinese  line  of  beauty  is  set  forth  as  follows:  “ Yang’s 

lids  and  eyebrow  were  twin  willow  leaves  above  a pearly 
pool.”  Where  we  wish  a happy  pair  the  conjugal  felicity 
of  two  mated  doves,  they  make  it  “ two  geese,”  and  at 
the  marriage  ceremony  the  bride  kowtows  to  a pair  of 
the  latter.  Where  we  wish  age  the  honors  of  “ cedars 
of  Lebanon,”  they  say  “ May  you  be  as  wide  as  a chrys- 
anthemum border,”  for  that  flower  is  their  emblem  of 


276 


THE  CHINESE 


longevity.  They  call  age  a candle  in  a draft.”  They 
could  not  wish  a child  to  be  as  pure  as  a lily,  for  that 
flower  is  their  emblem  of  death.  Their  flower  of  virtue 
is  the  plum  blossom.  Where  we  say  “ as  quick  as  a 
shot  or  a bird,”  their  figure  is  “ with  the  speed  of  flames.” 
Love  they  call  the  “ oil  of  the  lamp  of  life.” 

The  Emperor’s  palace  is  called  “ The  Palace  of 
Heaven,”  and  the  Empress’,  “ The  Palace  of  Earth’s  Re- 
pose.” Although  China  invented  the  compass  which 
points  to  the  South  Pole,  there  is  a temple  at  Peking 
dedicated  to  the  “ God  of  the  North  Star.”  Not  to  be 
behind  the  humor  of  Occidentals  who  build  cathedrals 
over  the  bones  of  a saint,  Peking  has  erected  an  obelisk 
over  a piece  of  Buddha’s  skin. 

Delightful  to  a strenuously  tired  Occidental,  Peace  is 
for  ever  in  their  mouths.  “ The  Gate  of  Heavenly 
Rest;”  “The  Temple  of  the  Eternal  Peace  of  the 
Lamas;”  “The  Gate  of  Extensive  Peace;”  “ The  Hall 
of  Secure  Peace,”  are  all  at  Peking. 

The  Shi  King,  a book  of  three  hundred  odes,  is  laden 
with  lyrics  as  dainty  as  are  Campion’s.  “ The  new  wife 
is  a peach  bud.  The  aged  pair  entwined  wistai'ias  are. 
Peace  is  a bamboo  spear  in  flower.  The  great  man’s 
soul  cried  out  for  God  and  swept  his  body  like  a husk 
away.  ‘ The  moth-like  eyebrows  of  my  moonlight  girl  ’ 
suggests  the  universal  use  of  powder  by  decent  women 
in  China.  Fei’s  step  is  as  light  as  the  lotus  on  water. 
As  typhoons  sweep  the  bamboo’s  sprays,  so  Death  blows 
up  old  Age’s  sleeve.  The  white  owl  hoots  of  death  upon 
the  stricken  poet’s  sill.  Slow  as  a nut-oil  wick  her  life 
departs.  His  concubine  the  cold  jade-jewel;  his  first 
wife  was  a true  peach  flower.  Years  fly  like  arrows,  one 
eager  to  pass  the  other  to  the  mark.  A forgiving  answer 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  277 


is  vernal  from  the  mouth.”  All  of  them  twine  nature  so 
as  to  adorn  some  human  interest,  and  the  human  motive 
is  not  read  into  nature  in  the  affected  occidental  fashion 
of  our  day. 

China  had  its  Chatterton  in  the  poet  Tu  F'u,  who 
starved  to  death  on  a temple’s  steps ; its  Edgar  Allan  Poe 
in  Kia  Yi,  who  wrote  centuries  ago  A White  Ozvl  Ode 
with  the  exact  plot  of  The  Raven;  and  its  Hood  in  Han 
Yu,  who  warns  the  farmer’s  son  who  became  a mandarin : 
“ Ne’er  forget  the  chastening  ditch  that  found  thee  poor 
and  left  thee  rich.”  A counterpart  of  Leigh  Hunt  is  Su 
Tung  Po,  who  languished  in^  prison  for  his  satires  and 
whose  imaginative  flights  are  little  short  of  Miltonic. 
His  poetry  best  bears  translation  into  English  without 
losing  as  much  of  the  boquet  of  the  original  as  other 
poets  suffer  in  the  transition.  Li  Po  was  their  Ovid  in 
the  praise  of  wine  and  women;  Chuang  Tze  their  Shel- 
ley in  imaginative  flights. 

Szma  Tsien,  who  wrote  his  great  history  B.  C.  100, 
compares  with  our  Herodotus,  and  Li  Pai  with  our 
Horace.  Outside  of  the  realm  of  pure  literature,  the 
fifty  volumes  of  Li  Shi  Chin  published  in  1590  are  at 
once  a Materia  Medica  and  an  Audubon.  Chinese 
naturalists  describe  with  surprising  exactness  the  habits 
of  animals,  fish  and  insects.  As  an  illustration  of  official 
knowledge  on  these  subjects,  note  this  extract  from  a 
late  proclamation  of  the  viceroy  of  the  two  Kwang 
Provinces  concerning  the  extirpation  of  grasshoppers: 
“ During  this  month  great  flights  have  appeared  in  our 
adjoining  province.  At  this  time  our  second  crop  of 
rice  is  in  the  blade.  The  insects  first  are  seen  on  the 
borders  of  large  morasses.  They  produce  their  young 
in  hillocks  of  black  earth  an  inch  deep,  the  hole  remain- 


278 


THE  CHINESE 


ing  open.  The  nests  are  in  colonies.  One  grasshopper 
drops  ten  pellets,  each  containing  one  hundred  young. 
At  early  dawn  they  can  not  fly  easily  from  the  tender  rice 
as  the  dew  is  on  their  wings.  Catch  them  at  the  nest 
and  in  the  morning.  At  evening  when  fed  they  resort  to 
one  spot.  There  dig  a trench  with  wings  and  fill  it  with 
fire,  throwing  flaming  brush  over  them  as  they  crawl 
in  heaps  toward  the  pit.” 

That  their  criticism  can  be  patriotic  and  sturdy,  the 
following  will  illustrate.  Under  the  temple  bells  and  the 
bamboos  that  whispered  of  Chinese  sages  who  studied 
beneath  them  when  Europe  and  America  were  fastnesses 
for  the  auk  and  the  reindeer,  and  our  warriors  wore 
wolf  masks  over  their  heads,  a bonze  thus  accumulated 
his  criticism  of  us.  “ The  Anglo  Saxons  and  the  West 
deride  us.  Why?  You  were  great  only  once  and  that 
time  is  not  now.  You  will  never  produce  a Bible  or  a 
Shakespeare  again,  for  used  to  luxuries  as  you  are  now, 
you  will  for  ever  despise  the  simple  poverty  that  pro- 
duced the  poetry  of  Elizabeth’s  time  and  the  manly 
virtues  which  evolved  the  philosophy  of  Plato’s  and 
Paul’s  day.  The  asceticism  and  unselfishness  of  your 
Bible  gave  you  sturdy  virtues,  but  now  that  you  have 
machinery  you  are  looking  unto  wealth  for  greatness, 
forgetting  the  odium  of  your  despised  Croesus  and  that 
your  philosophic  (so-called  religious)  literature  alone 
has  brought  you  strong  unto  the  present.  You  must 
fall.  You  ask  us  to  impoverish  our  thought  and  our 
character  by  a universal  debauch  of  pampering  and  really 
ignorant  riches.  Our  State  is  not  reared  over  a burning 
mine,  for  where  no  individual  fortune  exceeds  half  a 
million  (since  Li  Hung  Chang  passed)  there  is  no  cause 
for  rebellious  envy  on  the  part  of  the  unhappy  many 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  279 


against  the  privileged  few,  and  little  opportunity  for  that 
grinding  oppression  which  breeds  undying  hate  because 
prominence  and  selfishness  are  synonoinous. 

“ Every  garment  frays  first  at  the  hem  and  every 
branch  dies  first  at  the  tip;  so  your  furthest  colonization 
in  America  shows  the  first  signs  of  the  protest,  the  denial 
of  justice  by  the  privileged,  and  the  decay  of  confidence, 
but  the  root  in  England  will  die  too.  How  inconsistent 
you  are ; your  society  despises  the  emigrants  now  reaching 
you,  but  you  clamor  that  you  are  descendants  from  still 
poorer  emigrants.  Anchored  to  the  soil  as  we  are,  we  will 
never  swing  in  history,  as  you  will,  between  the  extremes 
of  a tyrannous  oligarchy  and  an  unstable,  socialistic  prole- 
tariat. W^e  shall  always  surpass  you  in  the  judgment 
of  universal  history  and  the  immemorial  God  (Tien), 
and  in  the  production  of  our  Shakespeares  and  Platos, 
for  our  State  is  founded  on  an  honest  poverty  which  has 
time  to  think  and  courage  to  be  virtuous.  We  have 
never  enslaved  manhood  within  the  State  as  have  your 
Roman  and  Saxon,  or  enthralled  alien  dependencies  to 
our  chariot  of  pride,  as  do  your  Briton  in  India  and  your 
American  in  the  Philippines.  When  you  have  retro- 
graded to  an  opulent  barbarism  sufficiently  savage  to  at- 
tack us,  we  shall  destroy  you  in  the  resort  to  arms,  not  so 
much  by  our  strength  as  from  your  weakness  and  the 
lack  of  patriotism  among  your  classes.  The  test  will 
then  be  whether  privilege,  or  land,  makes  men. 

“ There  have  been  peoples  as  ostentatious  as  you  be- 
fore, Babylon  for  instance,  and  in  public  monuments  the 
Pyramids  are  as  stupendous  as  what  Pittsburgh  makes; 
yet  they  stand  for  a dead  race;  not  so  our  Great  Wall, 
which  stands  with  a live  race.  Again  I repeat,  you  are 
not  doing  anything  new,  and  you  were  greatest  as  intellec- 


28o 


THE  CHINESE 


tual  men  in  Shakespeare’s  day,  and  as  moral  men  in 
Paul’s  day.  The  intellectual  decline  has  been  gradual; 
next  came  Milton,  and  then  you  dwindled  down  to  Dick- 
ens, Longfellow  and  Carlyle,  till  now,  how  thin  is  your 
veneer  of  letters.  Morally,  how  dead  and  sad  the  review. 
You  are  the  only  race  who,  powerful  enough  to  retain  it, 
has  given  over  your  religious  shrine,  Palestine,  to  an  un- 
believer, and  yet  five  hundred  million  of  you  attribute  all 
your  civilization  to  the  Bible  of  that  land.  This  astound- 
ing sacrilege  has  eternally  amazed  us,  and  we  can  see  no 
reverence,  love  or  depth  in  you.  We  glory  in  teaching 
Confucius  in  all  schools  and  in  preserving  his  shrine. 
You  throw  your  greatest  book  out  of  your  national 
schools.  You  were  harder  to  civilize  than  any  race,  a 
bloody  tearing  down  preceding  every  building  up,  as 
under  Cromwell  and  in  Russia  to-day.  For  every  little 
law,  you  have  sent  your  people  to  their  swords  to  win 
it. 

“Your  whole  system  is  one  of  objection  to  improve- 
ment and  temperamentally  you  could  not  accept  as  a 
race  a peaceful  endowment  of  civilization  such  as  Con- 
fucius bestowed  upon  us.  All  your  Emperors  dress  as 
generals  of  war;  ours  alone  as  a philosopher  of  peace. 
When  we  would  translate  your  word  Liberty,  we  perforce 
are  driven  to  the  character  Rebellion,  for  so  you  have 
won  it.  We  have  never  flung  derision  at  the  constitution 
as  have  your  races  when  the  bravoes  of  Milo  and  Clodius, 
of  doges  and  dukes,  made  private  altercation  a substitute 
for  public  pleading.  Where  each  citizen  already  rules 
himself  with  Shun  (morality)  the  State  is  already  clothed 
in  Liberty.  In  the  adaptation  of  ourselves  to  the  inven- 
tive age  you  will  see  that  we  shall  reach  the  higher  planes 
without  bloody  disorganization,  as  we  are  a race  with 


City  wall,  Ching-tu.  capital  of  Sze-chuen,  furthest  \\'est  province. 
The  lower  part  is  the  oldest  city  wall  in  China,  contemporary 
with  the  Great  Wall.  Watchman  on  water  gate.  Phy- 
sician gathering  simples.  In  early  times  Sze-chuen 
was  famous  for  its  engineers. 


CO>^«lCMT.  UNOCHWOOe  * UhD(*wOOO,  M V. 


Looking  from  the  Imperial  Bank  of  China  toward  the  British  and 
American  quarters,  Shanghai,  East  Central  China. 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  281 


conscience  and  faitli  enougli  to  follow  what  Time,  the 
only  test  (and  test  us  by  it)  has  proved  to  be  right. 
Look  to  yourselves!  ” 

The  performance  of  a theatrical  company  (Thespians 
in  China  are  called  “ Brothers  of  the  Pear  Trees  ”)  is 
extended  to  the  length  of  a festival.  Great  structures  of 
bamboo  and  mats  are  erected  near  the  water-front,  partly 
that  the  lapping  waves  may  be  referred  to  by  the  gestur- 
ing actor  in  the  climax  of  the  play,  but  particularly  in 
order  that  the  sampan  people  may  have  no  excuse  for 
staying  away.  Historical  dramas  from  their  Shakes- 
peare-Jonson-Fletcher  collection,  the  “ one  hundred  plays 
of  the  Yuan  Dynasty,”  which  take  days  to  perform,  are 
given.  Farces  and  sketches  are  interspersed  to  enliven 
proceedings.  The  titles  of  the  latter  are  as  we  might 
expect:  Ah  Bing  Selling  His  Pig;  The  Congratulations 
of  the  Eight  Genii;  A Visit  to  the  Moon;  The  Fairy 
Wife,  etc.  On  April  i6th,  reminiscent  of  the  world’s 
creation,  a religious  drama  is  performed,  the  title  being 
The  Opening  of  the  Peach. 

The  two  lowest  grades  of  Chinese  society,  both  of 
whom  are  debarred  from  entering  the  classical  examina- 
tions, are  a keeper  of  an  opium  den  and  an  actor.  It  can 
therefore  be  judged  how  all  China  burst  into  a laugh  of 
derision  when  there  was  added  in  1906  to  the  Exempts 
under  the  American  Exclusion  Act,  immediately  after 
scholars,  who  are  the  highest  class,  actors,  who  are  dia- 
metrically opposed.  Yet  priests  and  actors  fraternize 
sometimes.  At  Chowtung  in  Yunnan,  the  gorgeous  Tem- 
ple of  the  Black  God  has  a theatrical  stage  set  up  in  the 
court.  This  stage  displays  in  perfect  proportion  the  best 
features  of  Chinese  architecture  and  is  notable.  In  the 
courtyard  of  the  Temple  of  the  God  of  Riches  at  Tang- 


282 


THE  CHINESE 


yueh,  just  on  the  borders  of  Burmah,  a theater  is  set  up, 
and  one  can  pray  or  laugh  under  the  patronage  of  the 
same  bonze.  The  costumes  of  the  actors  are  as  gorgeous 
as  description  can  paint,  even  surpassing  the  robes  of  the 
throne.  In  passing  we  might  mention  that  the  favorite 
gown  of  those  who  act  the  part  of  an  empress  is  of  yellow, 
with  a very  wide  border  of  purple  wistaria.  Women  do 
not  act.  Their  parts  are  taken  by  men,  and  the  Chinese 
in  whose  speech  many  falsetto  tones  are  in  constant  use, 
can  dissemble  the  female  perfectly.  When  applause  is  ex- 
pected from  the  falsetto  ladies  on  the  stage,  it  is  given 
in  a chorus  of  orthodox  squeaks.  As  soon  as  the  curtain 
is  rung  up,  all  the  actors  troop  out  and  kowtow  before 
the  mandarin’s  box,  which  sways  on  its  draped  bamboos 
in  more  apparent  than  real  jeopardy.  China  has  not  yet 
evolved  the  modern  drama,  so  popular  in  Japan,  where 
heroes  are  apotheosized  and  the  doings  of  gods,  mythical 
warriors  and  living  heroes  are  woven  into  a wonder  play. 
When  Nogi  and  Oyama  go  to  the  Honchodori  Theater 
the  curtain  is  rung  up  (or  really  tom-tommed  up)  to  re- 
veal some  slain  subaltern  of  Port  Arthur  in  the  act  of 
tearing  down  a Russian  flag,  while  mythical  Kagekio  and 
Terasu  present  the  hero  with  a sword  and  a dove. 

The  Chinese  actor  is  apprenticed  for  four  years  and 
the  repertoire  of  a star  consists  of  about  fifty  plays.  The 
playwright,  just  as  Shakespeare  did,  travels  with  the 
company  as  its  permanent  adapter  of  the  ancient  tragedies 
and  traditions,  and  proving  that  mankind,  whatever  the 
color,  has  ever  been  strung  to  the  same  chords,  he  never 
fails  to  consign  the  villain  to  tortures,  the  oppressor  to 
accidents  sent  by  the  gods,  and  the  hero  to  recompense, 
bliss  and  applause.  The  Actors’  Guild  comprises  thirty 
thousand  members,  and  the  highest  individual  earnings 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  283 


are  eighteen  hundred  dollars  a year.  As  already  stated, 
certain  plays  are  performed  in  Buddhist  temples,  the  nuns 
being  permitted  to  dance,  but  these  plays  are  more  popu- 
lar in  the  country  bordering  Siam  and  Burmah,  and  if  we 
go  over  the  border  to  the  Wat  Chang  Temple  in  Bangkok, 
we  can  easily  find  bold  examples  of  them. 

A Chinese  city  shorn  of  its  street  signs  would  be  like 
a pheasant  plucked  of  its  plumage.  Rob  Heavenly 
Peace  Street,  at  Canton,  or  Tung  Tan  Street,  Peking, 
of  their  black  and  gold  signs  and  yellow  lanterns,  and  it 
would  be  as  though  you  tore  the  transforming  sunset 
from  the  bare  loess  hills  of  China.  Not  only  is  the 
beauty  of  gilt  work  exhibited,  but  marvelous  creations  in 
alto-rilievo  carving  are  hung  out.  The  signs  follow  the 
triple  plan  of  mentioning  the  name,  birthplace  and  motto. 
The  business  is  not  mentioned,  as  “ Fung  Shan,  born 
Sam  Shui  City, — This  is  the  Abode  of  Generosity  and 
Light.”  Sometimes  merely  the  picture  of  an  animal  is 
the  sign.  The  tiger  has  been  adopted  by  the  Clothiers’ 
Guild.  With  the  words  “ Strength  and  Courage  ” 
added,  it  is  hung  out  over  the  tailors’  shops  which  are 
equipping  the  new  Volunteer  Corps.  Here  is  a hasty 
gleaning  of  the  street  names  of  Canton : “ New  Green 

Pea,”  “ Medicine,”  “ Golden  Flower,”  “ Plum  Lane,”  and 
as  this  is  the  city  which  next  to  jade  worships  the  pearl, 
we  find  they  have  named  a street  and  their  river  (Chu 
Kiang)  after  the  latter  jewel.  A popular  name  for  a 
city  gate  is  “ Entrance  of  Bright  Amiability.”  The 
beauty  of  poetry  is  not  without  its  humbling  fault  of 
humor,  a charcoal  shop  being  called : “ The  adornment 

of  the  Eyes,”  and  a pawnshop  “ Virtuous  and  Prosper- 
ous.” 

In  the  rear  where  the  cashier,  or  shroff,  sits  behind  his 


284 


THE  CHINESE 


swanpan,  the  shop  is  no  less  gorgeous  than  the  signs. 
The  front  half  of  the  store,  where  the  willow  and  cam- 
phor-wood boxes  of  merchandise  are  packed,  is  paved 
with  plain  red  brick  tiling  or  granite  blocks,  but  the  rear 
portion  is  divided  by  a screen  of  massive  and  elaborately 
carved  blackwood,  pointed  heavily  with  gold,  and  over- 
head is  carved  a gilded  Confucian  motto,  such  as  “ To 
become  permanently  wealthy,  you  must  exercise  the  prin- 
ciple of  right.”  The  stench  of  the  street  is  fought  back 
by  burning  pieces  of  sandal  and  teak  woods,  and  by  in- 
cense sticks  smouldering  in  the  ashes  before  the  ancestral 
tablets,  for  all  China,  except  the  fokis,  lives  where  it 
works.  They  are  only  business  streets,  but  the  signs 
suggest  to  a stranger  the  way  to  a temple,  not  only  by 
the  religious  mottoes,  but  by  the  lavish  beauty  of  red, 
green  and  gold  lacquer,  Chinese  signs  perforce  are 
pendant  and  narrow,  for  two  reasons : because  the  letter- 
ing must  be  horizontal,  and  because  the  streets  are  so 
narrow.  There  are  three  characteristic  things  which  we 
learn  to  associate  with  and  love  in  Chinese  cities:  first, 
the  signs,  and  then  the  pagodas  and  lanterns.  As  the 
traveler  goes  farther  north,  notably  at  Liao  Yang,  it  is 
noticeable  that  the  signs  are  not  suspended  but  are  ele- 
vated upon  lacquered  posts.  The  post  itself  bears  the 
firm’s  motto  and  the  arms  are  given  up  entirely  to  deco- 
ration. In  Kin  Chou  Fu  in  Manchuria,  the  one-storied 
khan  or  inn  is  marked  by  a tall  lamp  post  and  a long 
semaphore  arm,  from  which  hangs  a string  of  metal 
rings  with  horse-hair  plumes,  which  flutter  out  an  in- 
vitation to  the  camel  drivers  from  distant  Mongolia  to 
rest  a while.  Occasionally  mine  host  greets  a suspicious 
Japanese  or  a curious  Westerner  who  has  the  twin  habits 
of  roaming  and  writing.  Rich  merchants  provide  in  their 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  285 


wills  for  inns,  as  a public  benefaction,  and  depend  upon 
the  monumental  gates  which  front  them  for  their  glory. 

Other  characteristic  architectural  features  are  the  walls 
which  are  built  around  private  residences  and  com- 
pounds; the  monumental  topes  of  the  dead  lamas,  and 
the  pai~loa  arches  in  honor  of  widows  who  would  not  re- 
marry. The  walls  are  composed  of  a stucco  called  cliu- 
nam,  generally  mauve  colored,  and  a foot  from  the  top  is 
inserted  a dainty  fretwork  of  tiling.  Set  into  the  stucco 
at  wide  intervals  are  panels  of  blue  and  white  porcelain. 
Nothing  is  crowded  in  the  work  of  their  architects  who 
believe  in  the  beauty  of  line  and  the  significance  of  plain 
masses  relieved  only  a little. 

In  the  middle  of  the  main  street  at  Wuchow  stands  a 
noble  circular  archway  which  sets  the  view  in  a frame. 
There  are  two  wing  arches  with  smaller  circular  open- 
ings. None  of  these  arches  is  made  to  drive  through; 
they  must  be  circumvented.  The  most  pleasing  pai-loa 
arch  is  erected  on  the  shore  of  the  lake  in  the  grounds 
of  the  Summer  Palace,  Peking.  In  proportions,  grace, 
and  just  enough  of  the  sumptuous  carving,  it  is  alto- 
gether a delight  to  western  eyes.  As  a rule,  however, 
the  architecture  of  arches  in  the  northern  provinces,  such 
as  Shansi,  is  Doric  in  its  simplicity,  as  compared  with 
the  more  bizarre  and  ornamented  arches  of  the  southern 
provinces.  The  most  famous  arch  in  China,  the  most 
individual  arch  extant,  is  that  which  stands  at  the  entrance 
to  the  Ming  Tombs  near  Peking.  Five  towers  crown  its 
five  square  arches.  It  is  a massive,  awesome  and  tri- 
umphant memorial  to  the  great  artistic  emperors.  Na- 
poleon copied  Titus’  arch;  America  copied  Napoleon’s, 
but  the  Mings  found  in  themselves  the  original  inspira- 
tion for  an  architectural  expression  which  has  never  been 


286 


THE  CHINESE 


equalled  for  balance,  power,  scope,  truth,  and  singular 
daring.  Standing  in  the  now  unpeopled  plain  over 
against  the  mountains  of  the  creator,  it  seems  almost 
Eternity’s  monument,  magnificent  amid  the  sorrows  and 
desolation  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  earth.  See  it  and 
be  steadied  in  your  taste  for  ever. 

Whatever  adverse  may  be  said  of  Chinese  perspective, 
there  are  certainly  no  painters  of  birds,  insects  and 
flowers  to  equal  them.  They  catch  the  poise  and  color 
to  a second.  They  delight  to  deceive  their  larks  and 
short-tailed  cats  with  their  canvases.  Famous  also  are 
the  temple  scenes  of  Wu  Tao  Tsz,  which  are  sought  for 
the  royal  collections. 

For  uniqueness,  Canton’s  concentric  carved  ivory  balls 
can  not  be  overesteenied.  How  wonderfully  the  work- 
men cut  one  within  another ! Each  one  is  minutely  fash- 
ioned into  beautiful  open  tracery  so  that  the  partitions  left 
shall  show  flowers,  pagodas,  temples  and  animals.  The 
scalpel  which  carves  the  balls  is,  of  course,  introduced 
through  the  holes  of  each  completed  ball. 

If  anything  artistic  is  found  inland,  they  will  tell  you 
it  was  made  at  Canton  or  Nanking,  the  latter  city  in 
addition  enjoying  a literary  fame,  and  being  the  center 
of  the  book  trade.  The  Chinese  have  a saying:  “ You 

never  know  what  luxury  is  till  you  have  lived  in  Canton,” 

As  odd  as  the  native  appreciation  in  medicine  of  gin- 
seng, for  which  we  have  no  estimation,  is  their  appreci- 
ation of  the  yuk,  or  greenish-white  jade  stone.  Nothing 
can  take  precedence  of  it  as  the  chief  object  of  virtu  in 
Chinese  taste,  in  which  place  it  has  ruled  supreme  since 
the  second  century,  B,  C.  It  is  sometimes  set  as  a wheel 
around  a golden  hub,  and  is  cut  into  rings  and  hair-pins, 
but  generally  it  is  made  into  a massive  seal  representing 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  287 


a monkey  or  a pear.  The  Metropolitan  Museum  of  Art, 
New  York,  has  the  finest  collection  in  America.  The 
stone  is  softer  when  first  mined  than  it  is  after  exposure, 
when  it  becomes  exceedingly  hard.  The  polish  gives  it 
a soapy  appearance  and  texture.  The  stone  is  found  in 
small  pieces  in  river  beds  in  Mongolia,  but  the  chief 
source  is  the  mountains  of  Yunnan,  and  Yunnan  City 
and  Canton  dispute  the  supremacy  for  the  cutters’  shops. 
The  Yunnan  quarries  at  Tali  also  supply  the  cloudy 
marble  which  is  carved  along  the  veins  of  color  into  fan- 
tastic trees,  landscapes  and  animals. 

In  Kwong  Man  Shing’s  and  Wing  Cheong’s  jewelry 
shops  on  Queen’s  Road  Central,  Hong-Kong,  you  will 
notice  that  no  prices  are  fixed  upon  the  many  gold  ar- 
ticles which  are  worked  generally  in  20  carat  metal.  The 
weighing  is  done  before  you  on  a long  and  short  lever 
of  ebony  or  ivory,  which  is  notched  with  minute  gradu- 
ations. Jewels  are  also  weighed,  as  well  as  examined 
before  the  glass  and  flame.  The  link  cuff-buttons,  popu- 
lar with  foreigners,  always  bear  the  characters  shao  (long 
life),  and  fuh  (happiness). 

Those  who  have  traveled  in  the  Orient  will  recall  the 
captain  warning  them  from  the  rail  which  has  been  newly 
lacquered  while  the  steamer  laid  in  port.  The  varnish 
is  very  poisonous,  the  gatherers  who  work  at  night  among 
the  varnish  trees  at  Ningpo  having  to  protect  face  and 
hands.  The  tree  is  a species  of  rhus.  The  process  of 
lacquering  book  covers  and  objects  of  virtu  is  a tedious 
one.  It  must  be  performed  in  a room  which  is  sealed 
from  wind  and  dust.  The  applications  oddly  dry  best 
when  it  is  damp  and  with  a temperature  of  about  eighty- 
seven  degrees.  Each  application  of  dense  black  is  pol- 
ished with  powdered  charcoal  and  pumice  stone.  When 


288 


THE  CHINESE 


the  gold-leaf  powder  is  applied  through  a sieve  which  is 
tied  over  the  end  of  a bamboo  tube,  the  artist  must  be 
sure  of  his  slightest  movement,  as  the  gummy  surface 
will  not  permit  the  slightest  correction.  Lighter  colors, 
such  as  the  golden  brown  and  green,  are  effected  by  mix- 
ing  gums  of  other  trees,  as  well  as  pig’s  gall  and  camellia 
oil.  Gilt  flowers  are  laid  between  the  different  layers 
so  that  as  the  lacquer  wears,  the  glorious  blossoms  rise 
gradually  to  the  surface,  even  as  a lotus  bursts  through 
the  dark  swamp.  This  is  the  idea  in  the  minds  of  both 
the  artist  and  the  connoisseur.  The  carving  of  the  thick 
lacquer  paste  is  a lost  art  of  the  Imperial  manufactories 
of  the  Ming  dynasty.  The  product  shone  with  the  bril- 
liancy of  a jewel. 

Wayside  shrines  are  as  numerous  as,  but  far  more 
beautiful  than  the  bizarre  specimens  that  one  finds  in 
Mexico  or  Spain.  Sometimes  two  monoliths  with  gilt 
texts  artistically  applied,  support  a highly  decorated  cap- 
stone. Sometimes  the  shrine  is  a miniature  temple 
of  solid  blocks,  with  merely  the  incense  aperture,  while 
others,  like  the  Altar  of  Heaven  in  the  suburbs  of  Fu- 
chau,  are  jewel-like  in  crimson  and  gold  lacquer,  and 
are  equipped  with  luxurious  Nanking  porcelain  seats  and 
kongs  of  flowers. 

Carved  stone  lions  are  the  most  popular  of  all  statues 
in  a land  which  has  no  lions.  That  in  front  of  the  Lama 
Temple,  Peking,  is  an  excellent  example,  as  are  also 
those  which  decorate  the  great  flight  of  steps  to  the 
temple  on  Siung  Shan  Island  at  Chinkiang.  These  are 
all  made  at  Nanking,  China’s  Athens  of  sculpture. 

The  vermilion  of  Canton  is  a characteristic  coloring 
perfected  by  a famous  secret.  The  quicksilver  which  is 
employed  in  its  preparation  at  present  is  largely  brought 


CHINESE  ART  AND  LITERATURE  289 


from  America,  and  how  the  Chinese  importers  of  Des 
Voeux  Road,  Hong-Kong,  squabble  over  the  elusive 
globules  which  have  escaped  into  the  hold  of  the  vessel 
from  the  long  retorts.  The  basal  powder  is  produced 
first  as  a sublimation  in  contact  with  sulphur  on  the  sides 
of  the  retorts.  The  Emperor’s  Great  Seal  is  dipped  in 
vermilion.  The  native  quicksilver  mines  are  far  inland 
in  Kweichow,  and  have  been  worked  since  the  fourteenth 
century.  The  product  is  transported  in  pigs’  bladders, 
but  poor  local  transportation  has  compelled  the  nation  to 
import  for  its  growing  requirements. 


VII 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  IN  CHINA 

The  Shang  Pu  (Board  of  Commerce)  has  pretty  well 
laid  out  the  railway  policy.  Half  of  the  midland  trunk 
line,  north  to  south,  from  Peking  to  Canton,  has  been 
completed  to  Plan-kau,  a distance  of  seven  hundred  and 
sixty-eight  miles,  and  is  known  as  the  Lu-Han  Railway. 
It  was  built  under  the  direction  of  Jadot,  a Belgian,  with 
a loan  of  thirty-one  millions  indirectly  from  France,  and 
repaid  in  only  ten  years.  The  road  is  thrown  across  the 
shifting  Hoang-ho  on  a notable  bridge  of  one  hundred 
and  twenty  spans.  Han-kau  (“mouth”  of  the  Plan 
River  as  it  meets  the  Yangtze)  boasts  of  a channel  six 
hundred  miles  to  the  sea,  twenty-three  feet  deep.  It  is 
the  emporium  of  the  black  tea  trade.  This  city  will  be 
the  future  Pittsburgh  of  the  Orient,  as  here  meet  the  iron, 
coal  and  antimony  beds  of  Hupeh.  She  has  already 
shipped  pig-iron  to  Brooklyn,  N.  Y.,  at  a price  laid  down 
of  seventeen  dollars  gold  a ton,  including  four  dollars 
and  seventy-five  cents  freight,  which  speaks  portentous 
volumes  for  the  future.  Two  things  are  noticeable  at 
Han-kau:  commercial  antipathy  to  the  European,  and 
the  popularity  of  the  Japanese  street  hawkers,  who  have 
never  before  come  so  far  inland.  Plan-kau  will  grow 
at  Shanghai’s  expense.  The  London  Homeward  Con- 
ference (Suez  route)  has  now  agreed  to  charge  the  same 
rates  from  Han-kau  as  from  Shanghai.  There  is  a 
province-owned  steel  plant,  with  an  output  of  one  thou- 

290 


MODERN  COMMERCE  xAND  BUSINESS  291 


sand  two  liundrcd  tons  a day,  already  in  operation  at 
Han-yang  (across  the  river  from  Han-kau),  which  is 
constantly  shipping  to  Japan  and  occasionally  to  Mex- 
ico. The  ancient  method  of  producing  carbon  iron, 
still  followed  in  opulent  Shansi  Province,  is  as  follows: 
ore  and  onc-quarter  of  coal  dust  are  mixed  in  sixty  cru- 
cibles, eighteen  inches  by  six  inches,  and  with  the  usual 
layers  of  coal,  cinders  and  clay,  are  placed  in  a furnace 
which  is  fired  for  sixteen  hours.  Very  fine  wrought  iron 
is  afterward  hammered  from  the  product  over  a wood 
fire. 

The  railway  from  Peking  to  Canton  will  run  almost  all 
the  way  over  and  between  beds  of  iron  and  coal,  the 
largest  in  the  world.  Every  prophecy  in  this  respect  of 
Richtofen  thirty-eight  years  ago,  has  been  verified,  in- 
credulous as  it  seemed  at  that  time.  The  next  largest 
area  is  in  Shansi  with  its  fourteen  thousand  square  miles 
of  anthracite,  twenty-two  feet  thick,  and  immense  bi- 
tuminous beds  besides.  Then  follows  Szechuen  with 
its  fabulous  beds  which  crop  out  in  plain  sight  even  along 
the  gorges  of  the  Yangtze  River.  Who  would  suspect 
that  China  mined  twenty  million  tons  of  coal  last  year? 
You  have  hardly  left  Peking  when  the  old  transportation 
system  appears  in  strong  contrast  with  the  new.  xAt 
Paoting  Fu,  a name  of  shame  because  of  the  murder  of 
the  American  missionaries  in  1900,  shaggy  dromedaries 
and  wheelbarrow  trains  come  down  to  the  railway  from 
the  Shansi  mines.  The  camels  are  led  by  a wooden  peg 
inserted  through  the  nose.  They  cost  fifteen  dollars  each. 
Every  driver  is  a one-time  Boxer.  At  Tsechow,  a moun- 
tain of  anthracite  is  tilted  three  thousand  feet  above  the 
plain.  To  reach  these  deposits  a branch  would  have  to  be 
run  thirty  miles  from  the  present  Peking-Han-kau  Rail- 


292 


THE  CHINESE 


way  at  a severe  gradient.  The  coal  beds  on  the  main  line 
level  are  flooded  with  the  exfiltration  seepage  of  the  Yel- 
low River  and  pumping  is  costly.  As  nearly  all  the  land 
is  a porous  loess,  drainage,  more  than  grades,  is  the  all- 
serious  problem,  and  China’s  cry  is  for  pumps. 

A New  Yorker,  familiar  with  the  small  locomotives 
which  used  to  pull  the  elevated  trains,  will  be  humorously 
reminded  of  the  old  days  of  jolt  and  grime,  by  seeing  sev- 
eral of  them  harnessed  on  the  Canton  end  of  the  line  to 
second-class  cars,  which  are  merely  flat  cars  with  a roof 
and  no  sides.  The  old  signal  disks  which  indicated 
“ Sixth  ” and  “ Ninth  ” Avenues  are  retained  on  the  tops 
of  the  cabs,  the  Chinese  engineer  explaining  with  the  in- 
finite courtesy  of  the  race : “ no  wanchee  change  good 
luck  pidgin.”  The  first  derailment  occurred  at  Fatshan 
when  a water-buffalo  became  patriotic  in  opposing  the  ef- 
frontery of  progress.  The  delight  of  the  Chinese  wreck- 
ing crew  over  the  use  of  the  derrick  was  indescribable. 
Former  Viceroy  Chum,  burning  with  zeal  for  the  New 
China,  is  advocating  the  extension  of  the  line  from  Can- 
ton to  the  deserted  deep-water  port  of  Whompoa,  ten 
miles  away,  and  famous  for  its  intercourse  with  foreign- 
ers for  three  centuries.  His  plan  is  a direct  challenge  of 
the  supremacy  of  Hong-Kong  in  the  far  East.  Hong- 
Kong  is  hotly  alarmed  over  the  possibility  of  seeing  one- 
third  of  her  vast  trade  depart.  Hong-Kong  has  the 
advantage  of  graving  docks  but  Whompoa  will  eventually 
offer  cheaper  coal  from  the  Pe  River  and  Fa  Yuen  mines, 
lower  freight  rates,  and  a patriotic  sentiment,  for  this  will 
be  their  own  port  for  Canton.  The  first  result  of  the  bat- 
tle has  been  Shum’s  removal  to  another  province,  and  ac- 
tivity in  building  the  Kowloon-Canton  Railway  with 
British  capital  and  partly  through  British  territory,  but 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  293 


Shum  and  those  who  think  like  him,  are  scotched,  not  ex- 
terminated. There  is  room  for  both  ports  in  the  develop- 
ment of  Southern  China. 

The  remaining  seven  hundred  and  fifty  miles  of  the 
Peking-Canton  Railway  will  be  financed  to  an  extent  by 
the  Hong-Kong  government  and  the  Hong-Kong  and 
Shanghai  Banking  Corporation,  with  the  opium  and 
other  revenues  of  the  two  Kwang  Provinces  as  security. 
The  road  will  be  partly  financed  by  Chinese  underwriters, 
America  having  unwisely  released  this  famous  concession 
at  a profit  to  the  American  holders  of  six  and  one-half 
millions.  What’s  the  use  of  thinking  imperially  when 
we  can  act  profitably  for  our  own  if  not  our  son’s  sake? 
The  concession  was  sold  by  Morgan  and  Company  to 
Chang  Chill  Tung,  Viceroy  of  Hupeh,  Chang  borrowing 
four  and  one-half  millions  from  Montague  and  Company, 
London,  and  their  underwriters,  on  the  understanding 
that  Britain  would  have  the  veto  over  any  foreigners 
employed  in  construction  work.  The  viceroy  of  the  two 
Kwang  Provinces  raised  the  other  two  and  one-half 
millions  of  the  purchase  by  a wonderfully  popular  sub- 
scription covering  tens  of  thousands  of  small  lots.  Thus 
the  concession  which  China  gave  away  cost  her  six  and 
one-half  millions  to  buy  back,  another  lesson  in  patriotism 
recited  bitterly  by  the  New  China  party,  but  partly  for- 
given when  America,  led  by  that  Daniel  of  justice  and. 
judgment,  Roosevelt,  restored  a third  of  the  absurdly 
large  Boxer  indemnity.  Only  tw’enty-eight  miles  of  road 
had  been  laid  down.  China  has  added  forty  miles. 
When  the  road  is  opened,  it  will  throw  the  marvelous 
gorge  scenery  of  the  Tapper  Yangtze,  where  the  cliffs 
rise  two  thousand  feet  from  the  river’s  edge,  open  to 
sightseers  at  a cost  of  only  three  days’  time  from  Canton. 


294 


THE  CHINESE 


Ninety  miles  from  Canton,  where  the  railway  passes  the 
Pe  River,  perpendicular  coal  seams  are  prominent,  and 
horizontal  mining  can  be  accomplished  at  little  cost.  The 
engineers  employed  in  nearly  all  Chinese  railway  construc- 
tion are  Japanese.  On  the  northwest  road  from  Peking 
to  Kalgan,  Chinese  engineers  are  employed.  This  road  is 
being  entirely  financed  from  the  coffers  of  the  Wai-Wu 
Pu  (Foreign  Board).  In  some  cases  the  cais  (foremen) 
are  also  Japanese.  The  Canton-Han-kau  road,  called  the 
Yuet-Han  Railway,  is  at  present  employing  the  most  fa- 
mous of  the  Chinese  railway  engineers,  Kwong  Sun  Mau. 
The  president,  Cheng  To  Chai,  is  experiencing  difficulty 
in  diking  out  the  provincial  political  floods  which  threaten 
to  engulf  his  financing  and  construction.  It  is  the  old 
temerity  of  the  South,  the  world  over,  to  awake  and  know 
herself. 

The  roads  from  Nanking  to  Shanghai,  and  through  the 
silk  province  from  Soochow  to  Ningpo  and  Wuchow,  via 
Hang-chow  (the  ancient  capital  of  the  Sung  dynasty  and 
the  loveliest  city  of  China)  are  under  way  through  these 
nursery  grounds  of  Chinese  liberty.  From  Swatow  to 
Chao  Chou  Fu  on  the  Little  Han  River,  sixty-five  miles, 
a railway  is  being  constructed,  and  will  later  be  extended 
to  the  earthquake  city  of  Amoy.  With  money  with- 
drawn from  Russian  schemes,  the  French  plan  to  build 
a trunk  railway  from  Hanoi,  the  capital  of  Tonquin, 
four  hundred  miles  through  tin  and  copper  territory  and 
elephant  fastnesses,  to  Yunnan  City.  The  mephitic 
Namti  Valley,  which  this  road  must  cross,  and  which 
separates  the  Red  River  from  the  high  tablelands,  is 
levying  a death  toll  of  seventy  per  cent,  among  the  work- 
ers, and  filling  the  Orient  with  a growing  scandal.  It 
is  already  impossible  to  get  the  Yunnanese  to  enlist. 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  295 


Coolies  ignorant  of  the  conditions  are  brought  from 
Shan-tung,  and  seventeen  thousand  of  these,  the  tallest 
and  strongest  of  the  race,  are  employed  in  the  Namti  Val- 
ley alone.  Work  is  entirely  suspended  in  the  primeval 
gullies  and  jungles  during  the  summer  rains.  In  the  cool 
season,  thirty-five  thousand  Annamese  are  brought  up  to 
the  work.  This  valley  is  destined  to  live  in  history.  No 
modern  public  work  ever  levied  such  a toll,  neither 
Panama,  Suez,  or  the  Russian  works  in  southern  Turkes- 
tan. It  will  be  four  years  before  Yunnan  and  Haiphong 
can  be  linked,  and  the  tale  of  difficulties  only  asserts  the 
adage  that  the  Tropics  do  not  write  histories  of  wars 
because  they  are  engaged  on  a more  compendious  History 
of  Fevers. 

At  Yunnan  City  this  French  road  will  connect  with  the 
British  concession  which  comes  from  Calcutta  and  Man- 
dalay, thence  going  northeast  as  far  as  Choong  King  at 
the  headquarters  of  the  Yangtze,  where  the  soil  is  so 
worked  by  irrigation  that  it  supports  twelve  hundred 
people  to  the  square  mile.  The  figures  involved  in  the 
opening-up  of  such  teeming  provinces  are  more  like  the 
unreasonable  repetitions  of  a dream  than  a commercial 
certainty  of  the  near  future.  This  province  alone  is  as 
large,  as  populous,  as  thrifty,  and  infinitely  richer  in 
natural  resources  than  France.  At  Yunnan  will  meet 
two  other  roads,  one  from  Bangkok  and  one  from  Can- 
ton, so  that  Yunnan  City,  from  a railway  aspect,  will  be- 
come a sort  of  St.  Louis,  as  a midland  distributing  point. 
On  account  of  the  altitude  of  six  thousand  feet,  Yunnan 
City,  two  days  from  Canton  by  the  railway,  will  be  a new 
summer  resort  for  the  coastal  tropic  cities.  The  sum- 
mers are  delightful  and  from  October  to  April  the  sun 
shines  from  a rare  and  cloudless  sky.  Yunnan  is  nearly 


296 


THE  CHINESE 


as  rich  as  Shensi  in  both  kinds  of  coal,  and  considering 
in  addition  her  gold,  copper  and  salt  deposits,  she  may 
be  termed  the  richest  in  minerals  of  all  the  provinces,  as 
she  is  also  the  lowest  in  intellectual  boasts,  for  here  the 
mixed  races  and  aborigines  abound.  Kwangsi,  the  ad- 
joining province,  which  the  railway  will  cross,  will  gather 
its  freight  from  unnumbered  antimony  mines. 

The  French  concession,  on  account  of  the  hilly  country, 
is  for  a narrow  gage  railway.  All  the  other  roads  in 
China  are  of  the  standard  American  gage  of  four  feet 
eight  and  one-half  inches.  At  present  the  only  transpor- 
tation from  Burmah  and  Tonquin  into  China  (that  by 
pack  trains)  collapses  four  months  annually,  owing  to  the 
rains  blocking  the  roads.  When  this  French  road  is 
built,  Kwang  Se  and  Yunnan  will  send  to  the  coast 
forty  million  bunches  of  bananas  a year,  as  well  as  valu- 
able cargoes  of  mangoes  and  the  delightful  ruby-red  man- 
gosteens,  which  last  must  have  been  the  apple  of  Eden, 
for  it  is  the  choicest  fruit  known  to  mankind.  A coast 
road  will  eventually  run  from  Canton  to  Amoy,  through 
the  British  territory  at  Kowloon,  and  from  Wuchow  on 
the  West  River  a road  will  run  one  hundred  miles  north 
to  the  world’s  richest  quicksilver  deposit  at  Kai  Chau. 
As  these  roads  have  been  wisely  planned  to  run  at  right 
angles  to  the  rivers  and  canals,  with  the  exception  of 
the  road  which  follows  the  Grand  Canal  from  Tientsin 
to  Soochow,  the  transportation  facilities  of  the  empire 
will  be  immediately  doubled.  The  additional  wealth 
which  will  be  added  to  the  property  of  Chinese  shippers 
when  the  railway  supersedes  the  canal  in  that  hot  country, 
can  be  computed  when  it  is  stated  that  it  is  necessary 
now  to  allow  the  tremendous  waste  of  twelve  per  cent,  for 
shrinkage  on  grain  compared  with  the  allowance  neces- 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  297 


sary  in  America  of  only  one-fourth  of  one  per  cent. 
These  railways  are  being  built  at  a cost  of  thirty-six  thou- 
sand dollars  a mile,  which  is  four  thousand  dollars  less 
than  America’s  cheapest  built  railway,  the  Great  North- 
ern, cost. 

A nation  which  has  erected  the  greatest,  costliest,  and 
most  enduring  monument  ever  raised  by  human  hands 
(the  Great  Wall,  which  they  call  the  Wan  Li  Chang, 
myriad  mile  wall)  can,  when  it  rises  in  the  same  numbers, 
cover  its  valleys  with  a web  of  railways,  and  as  America 
held  the  eyes  of  the  world  in  the  nineteenth  century  be- 
cause of  her  progress,  China  confidently  expects  that  the 
twentieth  century  will  likewise  be  hers,  as  Africa  will 
take  the  twenty-first.  With  all  this  proposed  develop- 
ment, China  will  even  then  remain  only  scratched. 
There  is  hardly  a word  concerning  a railway  into 
old  Shansi  Province,  which  is  as  large  as  Michigan. 
For  hundreds  of  miles,  under  the  loess  deposited  on  the 
plateaus  centuries  ago  by  the  Yellow  River  and  its  tribu- 
taries, and  which  can  be  dragged  down  with  a rake,  ex- 
tend vast  veins  of  anthracite  and  bituminous  coal  and 
iron.  The  mines  have  been  known  for  thousands  of 
years  to  the  Mongols,  as  compared  with  America’s  know- 
ledge of  anthracite  dating  back  only  to  1791.  Camel 
trains  of  coal,  and  small  articles  made  of  excellent  carbon 
iron,  have  been  sent  to  the  capital  of  the  province  and 
to  Peking  for  many  years.  Erosion  for  centuries  has 
been  uncovering  the  seams  for  the  pick  of  the  twentieth 
century  Chinese  miner,  as  he  digs  his  way  into  pre- 
eminent opulence  and  power.  The  only  thorough  min- 
eralogical  survey  of  the  inexhaustible  coal  and  iron  de- 
posits of  the  central  provinces  was  made  in  1870  by 
the  Russian  Richtofen  at  the  suggestion  and  with  funds 


298 


THE  CHINESE 


secured  through  the  Shanghai  American  Mr.  Cunning- 
ham. In  those  days  American  diplomacy  was  dominant 
at  Peking  through  the  power  of  Minister  Burlingame. 

A railway  from  the  capital,  Thai  Yuan,  would  have  to 
be  surveyed  along  the  Fuen  River  to  the  Yellow  River 
and  thence  to  the  Grand  Canal,  and  enterprise  could  read- 
ily make  the  richer  portion  of  this  Croesus  province  of  the 
north  tributary  to  Europeanized  Shanghai,  instead  of 
Peking,  which  latter  could  still  supply  herself  abundantly 
from  the  nearer  Ping  Ting  coal  mines  in  the  north  section. 
It  is  to  be  noted  that  the  coal  areas  of  China  are  gener- 
ally distributed,  while  in  America  the  possession  of  coal 
only  in  the  central  east  has  retarded  the  growth  of  the 
west.  On  the  railways  now  in  use,  especially  inland,  it 
has  been  necessary  to  use  colored  glass  in  the  coaches, 
as  the  coolies,  who  are  unfamiliar  with  anything  besides 
shell-lights,  in  their  excitability  over  the  passing  scenes, 
frequently  jam  their  heads  through  the  windows,  whose 
existence  they  are  not  aware  of.  European  engine 
drivers  have  been  dispensed  with,  and  natives  now  do 
the  work  at  a wage  of  thirty  cents  gold  a day.  As  illus- 
trating what  Chinese  labor  can  work  for  I would  say  that 
at  Hong-Kong  in  1903  we  got  the  cost  of  handling  cargo 
on  the  American  mail  ships  down  to  the  lowest  point 
ever  reached,  of  seven  cents  a ton,  against  forty  cents 
in  America.  Most  of  the  railway  travel  is  fourth  class, 
standing  room  only  being  provided  in  gondola  cars 
(some  with  a roof  but  no  sides)  at  one  cent  a mile. 
First-class  fare,  with  a leather  seat,  is  three  cents  a mile 
on  the  railroads,  and  one  cent  for  fifteen  miles  on  the 
native  house-boats  where  human  feet  propel  the  tread- 
wheel.  Freight  rates  on  the  railroads  for  rice  are  two 
and  nine-tenths  of  a cent;  machinery  two  and  three- 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  299 


tenths;  coal  one  and  eight-tenths  of  a cent  gold  per  ton 
per  mile,  against  an  average  rate  in  the  United  States 
of  less  than  eight-tenths  of  a cent  per  ton  per  mile,  and 
in  England  of  two  and  sixteen  one  hundredths  cents. 
It  is  not  surprising  therefore  that  the  net  profit  of  the 
Peking-Han-kau  Railway  in  1908  was  thirty-one  per 
cent,  and  that  the  members  of  the  finance  Pu  (Board) 
want  more  railways.  As  illustrating  the  industrial  status 
of  China  at  present  a study  of  the  freight  carried  by  the 
Shan-tung  Railway  reveals  coal  as  the  chief  factor,  fol- 
lowed in  order  by  beans,  oil,  cotton,  straw-goods  and 
crockery.  When  the  average  Chinese  makes  a shipment, 
it  is  generally  a “ personally  accompanied  ” one,  and  the 
railway  thus  secures  a third-class  fare  in  addition  to 
the  freight. 

In  condemnation  proceedings,  the  price  paid  for  land 
is  about  twenty-eight  dollars  an  acre,  or  five  dollars  per 
mao;  and  single  graves,  which  are  scattered  everywhere, 
like  sage-bush  in  the  desert,  are  purchased  at  two  dollars 
and  a half  each,  including  the  value  of  Fungshui!  For 
earthwork,  two  and  one-fourth  cents;  and  for  rock  bal- 
lasting eighteen  cents  per  cubic  yard,  is  paid  to  the  con- 
tractors. Ties  of  Japanese  kuriwood,  which  last  without 
creosoting  for  six  years,  cost  forty  cents  each.  Track 
laying  is  done  for  about  three  cents  per  lineal  yard.  One 
oddity  which  would  appal  our  railway  commissioners, 
is  the  obliteration  of  class  rates  when  merchants  club 
together  and  hire  a car.  They  may  put  in  it  any  class 
of  freight  they  desire,  the  rate  being  charged  on  the  basis 
of  second  class. 

The  advantage  accorded  and  always  demanded  by  the 
Japanese  is  illustrated  on  the  railway  from  the  treaty 
port  of  Swatow  to  the  prefectural  city  of  Chao  Chow  Fu, 


300 


THE  CHINESE 


the  concession  for  which  was  given  to  Chang  Yu  Nan, 
a wealthy  local  merchant.  All  material  is  being  sup- 
plied by  Japanese  contractors,  no  public  tenders  having 
been  invited.  The  engineers  are  all  Japanese  and  the 
rolling  stocl<  was  bought  through  Japanese  Manufactur- 
ers’ Agents. 

To  summarize  the  principal  railway  routes  which  will 
be  well  under  Avay  within  ten  years,  imagine  a central 
trunk  railway  from  Ottawa  to  New  Orleans;  and  routes 
from  New  Orleans  to  Oklahoma;  El  Paso  to  Kansas 
City;  Austin  to  Oklahoma;  Galveston  to  Oklahoma;  New 
Orleans  to  Tallahassee,  and  Halifax  to  New  York,  and 
you  will  comprehend  the  initial  extensive  program. 
What  effect  China’s  action  in  adopting  a four  foot,  eight 
and  a half  inch  gage  will  exercise  on  the  Indian  and 
Burmese  Railways,  remains  to  be  seen.  Fifteen  thousand 
miles  of  railway  in  India  are  five  feet,  six  inch  gage,  and 
the  remaining  twelve  thousand  miles  are  three  feet,  three 
and  three-eighth  inch  gage.  From  an  operating  point 
of  view,  China  should  probably  have  followed  the  broader 
Indian  gage.  When  India  built  her  railways,  she  had 
steamship  connection  alone  in  mind  for  through  busi- 
ness. That  the  Chinese  are  not  lacking  in  that  imagina- 
tion which  makes  countries  commercially  great,  is  evi- 
denced by  the  expectation  that  the  Peking-Kalgan  Rail- 
way will  be  extended  through  arid  Gobi  Desert,  and  join 
Koren  through  the  Kaikhta  Pass  with  Irkutsk,  thus 
saving  six  days  to  St.  Petersburg  as  compared  with  the 
South  Manchurian  Railway  route,  now  dominated  by  the 
selfish  Japanese.  It  will  be  remembered  that  before  the 
opening  of  the  Suez  Canal,  Kaikhta  was  the  mart  through 
which  China  traded  with  Russia.  Plumanity  at  large  is 
interested  in  the  rapid  extension  of  Chinese  railways. 


f OhOEftWOOD  A,  i 


Prince  Ching.  who  has  been  the  Power  Behind  Three  Manchu 
Thrones.  This  conservative  of  conservatives  surprisingly 
has  alone  advocated  most  advanced  views  for  the 
education  of  Chinese  women. 


I'lu’  wide  streets  of  the  Xortlieni  Cities,  Street  haz;i;ir  on  Kai-ier 
road,  runninf^  from  South  (late  to  Cliien  Men  (late. 

I’ekimj,  Cliiiia. 


Nanking  road,  principal  native  sliopping  district  of  Sliangliai, 
Eastern  Central  China. 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  301 


because  it  will  then  alone  be  possible  to  rush  supplies  from 
the  fields  of  plenty  to  the  famine  districts  of  the  three 
flooding  rivers,  the  Hoang-ho;  Han,  and  Yangtze,  and 
save  verily  hundreds  of  thousands  of  lives  each  year. 

Many  may  be  surprised  that  the  railways  came  with 
such  a rush,  but  the  way  was  prepared  by  the  extensive 
system  of  telegraph  wires  which  the  Danes  under  Scheirn 
strung  through  the  kingdom,  even  crossing  Yunnan  into 
Burmah.  All  the  ports  are  connected,  the  total  wirage 
being  forty  thousand  miles.  The  most  sensational  line  of 
wire  in  the  world  probably  is  that  crossing  the  Gobi 
Desert  in  Mongolia,  three  thousand  and  five  hundred 
miles  through  a generally  hopeless  stretch  of  blight  and 
immemorial  neglect.  Over  all  this  expanse  of  silence; 
over  the  ears  of  the  trudging  pony  and  camel  and  their  al- 
most as  obtuse  drivers ; over  the  solitary  shadow  of  a gla- 
cial rock  here  and  there,  how  the  songs  of  the  glad  parts 
of  the  earth  are  humming  in  the  dreams  of  the  half-awak- 
ened giantess,  China.  The  profit  to  the  government  from 
the  wires  in  1907  was  twelve  per  cent.,  and  again  the 
Finance  Pu  wants  more  of  them.  Only  fifteen  feet  be- 
low the  sands  of  Gobi  there  is  water  which,  if  raised, 
would  turn  the  earth’s  saddest  desert  into  the  lilac  and 
the  buttercup. 

The  I Chau,  or  Imperial  Courier  Service,  with  its 
thousands  of  wonderful  runners,  and  an  organization 
running  through  four  thousand  years,  will  continue  long 
after  railways  are  built,  but  more  like  our  rural  postal 
service.  These  runners  claim  as  a regular  thing  records 
that  ^rpass  Marathon,  and  it  is  a pity  that  some  of  them 
were  not  sent  to  the  Olympic  games.  A Chinese  track 
victory  would  win  the  popular  sympathy  of  the  world 
more  than  would  the  bloody  laurels  of  a fleet  of  war. 


302 


THE  CHINESE 


From  Peking'  to  Canton  one  hundred  miles  a day  over 
abominable  paths,  are  expected  of  the  relay  runners. 

There  is  already  a postal  service,  called  the  Min  Chu, 
which  radiates  from  the  treaty  ports,  which  was  estab- 
lished by  the  always  ready  Robert  Hart  for  the  Chinese. 

Travelers  who  have  enjoyed  the  comfort  of  the 
wide,  cool  seat  of  a high-wheeled  yellow  Macao 
jinrickisha,  once  used  generally  throughout  South  China 
treaty  ports,  will  lament  the  Japanese  invasion  of  China 
with  a lighter,  narrower,  plum-lacquered  ’rickisha,  which 
has  already  driven  out  the  Chinese  vehicle  at  Hong-Kong 
and  Shanghai.  The  coolies,  who  work  for  public  contrac- 
tors and  do  not  own  their  own  vehicles,  will  have  nothing 
to  do  with  the  heavier  Chinese  machines,  but  occasionally, 
in  the  Portuguese  Colony,  pulled  along  the  Praya  Grande 
by  her  liveried  runners,  a gentle  Macaense,  hid  beneath 
her  flowing  black  silk  Do-veil,  passes  you  in  a ’rickisha 
of  the  old  period,  which  rumbles  along  with  its  echoes 
of  slower,  quainter  and  courtlier  days,  which  will  soon 
be  a memory  throughout  the  whole  awakened  land.  The 
revulsion  which  comes  over  one  on  first  stepping  into  a 
human-drawn  ’rickisha,  will  not  quickly  pass.  It  is  hard 
foi^  a Westerner  to  degrade  his  fellow-man  so  literally 
to  the  position  of  a driven  beast.  The  Oriental  refutes 
this  point  of  view,  and  says,  “ I am  the  more  honest  in 
practising  that  we  all  are  servants  of  one  another.” 
Plowever,  there  is  no  other  means  of  moving  about  the 
streets  of  Japan  and  the  maritime  cities  of  China.  Hong- 
Kong  has  a tramway,  but  it  traverses  only  one  water 
street, — their  Praya.  Manila  has  a more  ramified  tram 
service,  but  wails  are  so  long  that  there  also  the  imported 
Japanese  runner  and  his  vehicle  are  indispensable.  The 
private  ’rickishas  of  Hong-Kong  are  pulled  by  one  runner 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  303 


and  pushed  by  two,  the  salary  of  the  three  amounting  to 
eighteen  dollars  gold  a month.  The  rivalry  of  the  own- 
ers in  equipping  their  runners  with  uniforms  of  conspicu- 
ous borders  is  one  of  the  characteristic  features  of  life  on 
that  famous  oriental  island. 

More  significant  than  the  ’rickisha  invasion  was  the 
announcement  of  President  Matsugata  of  the  Kawasaki 
Dock,  Kobe,  that  his  company  had  purchased  ten  thou- 
sand tsuho  of  land  at  Shanghai  for  the  purpose  of  erect- 
ing a branch  in  China,  and  competing  for  the  ship  work 
of  the  Yangtze  territory.  This  was  going  far  afield 
for  an  unprovoked  attack,  not  only  on  Chinese  but 
British  capital  and  political  sphere.  This  commercial  in- 
vasion has  not  been  one-sided,  for  China  has  now  found 
in  Japan  her  best  customer,  selling  her  last  year  sixty 
million  taels’  worth,  mostly  of  raw  material. 

The  Chinese  Imperial  Customs  duties  of  five  per  cent, 
ad  valorem  are  probably  the  smallest  of  all  international 
customs  imposts,  but  this  tax  at  the  treaty  ports  was  until 
lately  only  the  beginning  of  the  load  accumulated  on  im- 
ports. An  inland  tax,  under  native  control,  called  li- 
kin,  which  literally  means  a cash  a catty  (one-twelfth 
of  a cent  for  each  one  and  one-third  pounds)  is  generally 
added  despite  the  treaties  with  America,  Britain  and 
Japan,  from  province  to  prefecture  about  every  tw’enty 
miles,  until  the  bolt  of  Fall  River  arrives  at  the  retailer’s 
hong  or  store,  as  a luxury,  and  a mandarin  only  can  pur- 
chase what  the  rice-tiller  needs  to  comfort  his  blistered 
shoulders  from  the  sun.  Unifying  as  railways  may  be, 
they  will  accomplish  less  than  is  expected  until  the  likin 
absolutely  ceases  to  keep  the  provinces  disjointed.  The 
great  federator  of  China  has  therefore  yet  to  arise,  and 
it  will  be  he  who  positively  smashes  for  ever  the  whole 


304 


THE  CHINESE 


pythonic  chain  of  the  likin  system,  and  thus  makes  free 
inter-provincial  trade.  It  is  curious  to  note  that  no  likin 
is  levied  in  Mong-olia,  probably  because  the  poor  camel’s 
back  there  has  already  been  broken  with  the  burden  of 
its  debts.  Next  in  revenue-producing  powers  to  the  land 
tax,  comes  the  likin,  and  the  Imperial  Customs  following 
a long  way  off  with  a total  of  about  twenty-five  million 
dollars.  The  necessities  of  the  provinces,  owing  to  an 
abolishment  of  likin,  could  be  at  once  met  by  a tax  on 
mines  and  profits  from  railways,  without  adding  to  the 
burdens  of  the  farmer  or  shopkeeper,  one  cash  more  than 
at  present. 

The  governor  of  far  Shensi  Province  has  drifted  into 
the  Japanese  eddy,  and  is  exploiting  the  oil  wells  of  Yen 
Chang,  which  employ  Japanese  engineers.  The  oil  re- 
fines in  the  highest  grade.  The  Pennsylvania  of  China 
in  coal  and  oil  is  that  most  populous  inland  province,  Sze- 
Chuen,  where  the  natural  gas  flows  through  rude  bamboo 
tubes.  The  wondering  natives,  leading  it  beneath  their 
salt  evaporating  pans,  have  put  Japanese  matches  to  it, 
and  called  it  “ devil’s  breath.”  Encouraged  by  the  suc- 
cess in  industrial  developments  of  Viceroy  Chang  at 
Han-kau,  China  has  loaned  the  governor  of  Chinese 
Turkestan  one  hundred  and  seventy-five  thousand  dollars 
to  establish  a cotton  mill  in  the  far  eastern  corner  erf  the 
empire  at  Turfan  to  beat  out  Russian  goods. 

The  nineteen  Chinese  mints  are  entirely  under  provin- 
cial jurisdiction,  though  the  central  government  steps  in, 
as  in  1906,  when  the  Kiang  Nam  mint  over-produced 
copper  fun  coins.  It  is  the  viceroy’s  perquisite,  though 
he  is  sometimes  followed  closely  by  the  counterfeiters, 
who  smuggle  in  strips  of  Australian  copper,  and  export 
the  “ moonshine  ” stampings  for  tutenag,  into  the  interior 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  305 


provinces  whose  mintings  are  the  lowest.  A Chinese 
shroff  in  a bank,  and  the  native  croupier  at  a fan-tan 
game  are  experts  in  the  ring  of  true  coin.  They  care 
nothing  for  the  stamp,  whether  it  be  Mexican,  Spanish, 
Chinese,  or  Hong-Kong,  so  long  as  the  coin  is  pure  silver. 
So  little  respect  is  paid  the  provincial  coin  of  the  two 
Kwang  Provinces  in  the  south,  that  banking  houses  put 
their  “ chops  ” or  seals  on  the  dollar  pieces,  which  are 
dented  in  their  passage  into  unrecognizable  cup-shaped 
articles.  The  Hong-Kong  government  is  endeavoring 
to  teach  the  Chinese  respect  for  the  head  and  inscription 
on  coins  of  the  realm,  and  will  not  receive  at  the  post 
and  tax  offices  any  coins  of  the  king  which  are 
“ chopped.” 

The  sycee  of  commerce  is  the  perfectly  pure  silver 
which  is  melted  at  the  mint  into  bars  from  the  Mexican, 
Spanish,  American  and  Chinese  coins  that  are  received 
in  toll  at  the  haikwan  or  custom-house  on  a bullion  basis. 
The  silver  bars  so  produced  are  officially  called  wan-yin 
or  “ fine  silver,”  and  colloquially  se-sse  (fine  silk),  imply- 
ing that  the  metal  is  so  pure  that  it  can  be  drawn  out  in 
a thread  as  fine  as  silk.  The  Chinese  very  naturally  fall 
into  the  decimal  system.  Their  monetary  computation  is 
as  follows:  ten  copper  cash  or  li  (which  have  a square 
hole  in  the  center  and  Chinese  characters  on  one  side  and 
Mongolian  characters  on  the  other  side)  equal  one  fun; 
ten  fun  equal  one  tsien;  ten  tsien  equal  one  tad,  and  a 
haikwan  or  custom-house  tael  equals  seventy-four  cents 
in  our  money.  A string  of  one  thousand  cash  is  known 
popularly  as  a tiao,  and  is  equal  to  fifty  cents  gold. 
The  bar  of  sycee  is  sold  as  being  of  so  many  taels  in 
weight.  The  cash  coin,  known  as  far  back  as  one  thou- 
sand years  B.  C.,  is  the  most  generally  coined,  and  shows 


3o6 


iTHE  CHINESE 


the  minute  economy  of  the  Chinese  in  their  commercial 
dealings  with  one  another.  Their  economists  argue  that 
if  we  had  a lower  coin  than  the  cent,  our  households 
would  live  on  half  what  they  do,  as  shopkeepers  charge 
the  poor  a cent  for  what  is  worth  only  a twelfth,  and 
the  poor  in  America  as  well  as  China  of  course  live  from 
hand  to  mouth.  A Chinese  silver  dollar  and  dime  piece 
are  coined  in  the  two  Kwang  Provinces  in  the  south,  but 
their  stamp  gives  them  no  fixed  value.  They  are  only 
bullion  when  challenged  at  the  haikwan.  The  Kiang- 
nam  mint  issued  in  1906  fun  pieces  of  Yunnan  cop- 
per, but  they  were  unpopular,  and  were  withdrawn  when 
the  markets  took  them  at  a discount.  At  Kashgar  in 
Chinese  Turkestan,  copper  is  cast  into  ingots  and  used 
as  money  alongside  of  the  silver  sycee  bar. 

The  notes  of  private  banks,  called  “ flying  money,”  are 
in  wide  use,  though  the  advertisement  on  the  back  re- 
quests circulation  only  in  the  guild  district  or  hong  street. 
The  bank  has  to  give  security  to  the  viceroy  for  its  note 
issues.  There  is  little  counterfeiting  because  part  of  the 
note  is  written  by  hand  and  an  impression  copy  is  taken 
for  comparison  on  presentation.  Until  1909,  not  since 
1300  A.  D.,  has  the  government  itself  issued  treasury 
notes.  These’  notes  have  been  prepared  in  America. 
There  was  much  scandal  about  abuses  when  the  Mongols 
issued  paper,  one  being  that  the  government  discounted 
its  own  obligations.  An  old  government  note  of  the 
Mings,  dated  1368,  is  on  exhibition  in  New  York.  It 
reads  in  part : “ This  seal  makes  this  note  current  any- 

where under  heaven.  Counterfeiters  will  be  executed. 
Persons  giving  information  will  be  rewarded  with  two 
hundred  and  fifty  taels  and  all  the  properly  of  the  coun- 
terfeiter.” Only  China  and  Persia  of  the  greater  coun- 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  307 


tries  of  the  world  now  remain  on  a silver  basis.  Gold  is 
not  coined.  The  dust  and  virgin  nuggets,  known  as 
“ Huang-huo,”  are  washed  from  alluvial  sand  in  river 
beds  in  Szechuen.  In  Kwangsi,  the  next  province  west 
from  Canton,  much  business  is  carried  on  by  the  barter 
of  cotton  yarn.  An  early  Chinese  coin  was  made  of 
porcelain,  three  and  one-half  inches  across  by  one-fourth 
inch  thick,  bearing  the  legend,  “ Eternal  prosperity.” 
As  China  mines  little  silver,  in  times  of  depression  of 
imports,  bolts  of  silk,  blocks  of  dried  tea,  Mongol  riding- 
boots,  and  even  baked  earth  and  wooden  disks  bearing 
the  viceroy’s  chop,  have  been  the  circulating  medium. 
The  early  Buddhistic  writings  frequently  mention  the 
last  named  money,  as  the  priests  did  not  like  to  horde  it, 
both  from  want  of  room  and  want  of  appreciation,  which 
criticism  of  theirs  naturally  made  them  unpopular  with 
the  vice-regal  inscriber  of  the  “ chop.”  When  railways 
facilitate  circulation,  we  shall  see  another  oppression 
wiped  away,  namely  the  exorbitant  interest  rate  of  four 
per  cent,  a month,  which  obtains  at  feast  times  and  New 
Year  settlements  in  February.  Besides  the  fokis  on 
watch,  the  bankers’  safe  is  guarded  by  five  padlocks,  each 
requiring  a different  key,  which  is  carried  by  each  mem- 
ber of  the  firm,  so  that  all  must  be  present  in  order  to 
open  the  safe.  The  rate  of  interest  at  the  pawnshops 
is  thirty-six  per  cent,  a year.  To  protect  these  shops  in 
a land  where  there  is  little  police  protection,  the  penalty 
for  robbery  has  been  made  death.  Rocks  are  stored  on 
the  roof  so  that  they  may  be  thrown  down  on  an  attack- 
ing band.  The  pawnshops  are  the  most  conspicuous 
buildings  in  the  cities;  they  rise  high  and  square,  like 
forts,  over  every  other  roof  and  pinnacle. 

Small  native  newspapers  have  cropped  up  all  over, 


3o8 


THE  CHINESE 


and  Japanese  money  is  being  expended  to  swing  this 
important  influence  in  line  with  Japanese  prestige.  On 
this  field  of  tournament  will  meet  the  progressive  mer- 
chants, traders,  and  foreign-educated  Chinese,  against 
the  old-school  literati  and  official  classes.  Cartoons  have 
a wider  circulation  and  are  in  systematic  employment  by 
secret  societies  and  guilds.  A notorious  one  used 
during  the  boycott  of  1905  exhibited  Americans  goading 
their  “ god-beast,”  the  buffalo,  and  on  the  reverse  the 
same  Americans  goading  a Chinese. 

Quail  are  raised  tame  by  the  Chinese,  and  shipped 
across  the  Pacific  seven  thousand  miles.  This  bird  ranks 
eighth  in  the  heraldic  embroideries.  It  would  have  been 
given  a higher  place  were  it  not  trained  to  fight  in  the 
gaming  pit.  Fish  are  likewise  brought  alive  across  the 
Pacific,  this  being  a perquisite  of  the  ship’s  Chinese 
bo’sun.  The  beautiful  rice-birds,  yellow  as  Hartz  canar- 
ies, are  caught  in  nets  and  drowned  so  that  they  will  not 
lose  weight  in  struggling.  They  are  hawked  around  the 
streets  of  Hong-Kong.  The  Cantonese  have  long  been 
famous  for  their  delicious  preserved  little  oranges,  the 
comquats.  They  are  now  exporting  pickled  olives,  which 
compete  in  California  with  the  local  product.  A New 
Yorker  can  buy  in  Mott  Street  tinned  rice-birds  from 
Canton’s  suburbs. 

Over  three-quarters  of  the  uplands  of  China  have  not 
been  utilized  because  she  has  few  cattle  and  fewer 
sheep.  Vast  herds  of  Swiss  stock  could  be  grazed  on 
the  mountain  uplands  which  at  present  are  given  up  to 
scenery  for  Buddhist  temples,  or  empty  glebes  for  the 
Fungshui  nonsense.  Japan  is  importing  blooded  stock 
as  rapidly  as  her  thin  resources  will  allow,  and  as  China 
will  do  everything  Japan  does,  a vast  accretion  of  China’s 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  309 


wealth  in  herds  will  shortly  ensue.  A Canadian  imported 
a flock  of  sheep  and  set  them  free  on  the  islands  which 
guard  Junk  Bay,  Hong-Kong,  but  the  spear  grass  of  the 
southern  sea-coast  lacerated  the  windpipes  of  the  ani- 
mals. The  half  ^rild  cattle  of  the  Canton  delta,  with 
their  pronounced  hump,  look  like  diminutive  buffaloes. 
Their  faces  are  even  gentler  looking  than  our  Jersey 
breed.  A windmill  seems  a little  thing,  but  China  will 
need  a million  of  them  to  take  the  place  of  the  irrigation- 
wheel  treaders  who  will  be  called  from  the  fields  to  the 
mine  pits  within  the  next  five  years.  Will  America  or 
Germany  supply  the  million  windmills  to  sing  their 
music  beside  the  Chinese  homesteads? 

The  Manchurians  crush  vast  quantities  of  beans  by 
donkey-driven  rollers.  The  oil  is  used  for  food  and 
light.  The  cake  which  remains  is  used  partly  for  food 
and  partly  for  fertilizer.  Vast  as  is  the  quantity  of  pe- 
troleum now  imported  into  China,  it  has  made  so  little 
impression  on  the  absorbent  ability  of  the  nation,  that 
even  yet,  everywhere  one  goes,  little  else  is  noticed  but 
the  use  of  vegetable  oils, — on  the  ’rickisha’s  shafts,  on 
the  sampan’s  masthead,  in  the  huts  of  the  rice  tiller  and 
mulberry  picker,  and  at  the  idol’s  shrine.  The  popular 
illuminating  oil  is  produced  from  the  nut  of  one  species 
of  tea-plant.  Ground  nuts,  or  peanuts  are  crushed  in 
vast  quantities  for  the  oil.  Two  million  gallons  of  nut- 
oil  are  imported  annually  into  America  for  use  in 
the  manufacture  of  high  grade  varnishes.  This  rapidly 
drying,  tasteless,  but  rank-smelling  oil,  which  has  no  su- 
perior for  water-proof  requirements,  is  made  from  the 
purple-leafed  Hw^a  Tung  tree  (Aleurites  cordata).  Sze- 
chuen  Province  cultivates  it  abundantly  in  the  West.  It 
is  a common  sight  to  meet  coolies  carrying  the  nuts  in 


310 


THE  CHINESE 


bamboo  boxes  on  their  shoulders,  and  not  slung  between 
them  on  bamboos,  as  is  the  universal  method  of  carriage 
in  the  east.  On  the  coast,  Fu-chau  is  the  best  known 
center.  The  product  is  there  drawn  from  the  gorges  of 
the  picturesque  Min  River.  In  the  next  province  west, 
the  hills  along  the  Kan  River  are  clothed  with  the  trees, 
and  the  capital  Nan  Chang  turns  over  a busy  cash  in  the 
enterprise.  The  trees  which  grow  in  stony  ground,  bear 
in  six  years,  when  they  reach  a height  of  fifteen  feet. 
Oddly  the  pressure  on  the  poisonous  nuts  is  not  applied 
by  a screw  as  is  done  with  olives  by  us,  but  by  wedges, 
which  surprisingly  express  forty  per  cent,  of  the  fifty  per 
cent,  oil  which  the  nuts  contain. 

Manchuria  promises  to  become  wonderfully  successful 
in  the  culture  of  the  sugar  beet,  and  with  her  cheap  labor 
probably  will  conquer  in  wider  fields  across  the  Pacific. 
The  Manchurian  beets  contain  thirty  per  cent,  of  sugar, 
against  a percentage  in  our  country  of  eighteen  per 
cent. 

All  of  Kwangtung  produces  that  delightful  succulent 
orange,  famous  throughout  the  East,  known  as  the 
“ Coolie  ” orange.  It  is  thin-skinned,  slightly  smaller, 
but  fully  as  juicy  as  our  Indian  River  variety.  The  skins 
are  sedulously  preserved  and  sold  to  make  a tea  to  cure 
fevers.  Indeed,  in  the  treaty  ports,  the  fruit  is  called 
the  “ Quinine  orange.”  Mangoes,  despite  their  strong 
turpentine  taste,  grow  upon  the  palate.  The  small-pitted 
lychee,  with  its  cool,  sweet  flesh  of  pearl  color,  can  not  be 
over-praised  in  a land  where  the  longing  for  fruit  is  in- 
tense on  account  of  the  poor  quality  of  foods  available 
for  the  use  of  the  white  man,  and  the  salicylic  acid  in 
imported  foods.  The  yellow-skinned  whampee,  fragrant 
as  a flower,  has  a taste  between  a plum  and  a grape.  The 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  31 1 


punielo  or  giant  grape-fruit  grows  to  enormous  size,  and 
is  preferable  to  our  shard  because  of  its  mildness. 

The  egg-shaped  and  ink-red  persimmons,  together  with 
golden  limes  from  Hainan  Island,  add  to  the  varied 
colored  piles  on  the  fruiterers’  stands,  in  a picture  the 
most  welcome  that  the  Orient  presents  amid  all  its  for- 
bidding dirt  and  smells. 

On  the  hills  around  Canton  lie  the  terraces  where  the 
succulent  ginger  root  is  cultivated.  The  scene  is  a pretty 
one,  for  not  only  are  the  flowers  attractive,  but  the  long 
leaf  gleams  brilliantly  in  the  sun.  The  street  of  the 
syrup  workers  in  Canton,  where  the  ginger  is  preserved 
and  candied,  affords  an  interesting  excursion.  The  most 
notable  firm  is  the  Chai  Loong,  of  which  Wong  Ki  Sam 
is  the  versatile  president. 

When  some  machine  shall  be  invented  for  taking  the 
gum  more  cheaply  out  of  the  ramie  stems,  the  product 
will  add  vastly  to  China’s  wealth.  This  nettle  gives  four 
crops  a year,  producing  two  and  a half  tones  of  fiber  to 
the  acre,  and  the  cloth  is  well  known  for  its  silky  finish 
and  quality  of  adding  luster  when  mixed  with  wool  or 
cotton. 

So  long  as  rice  continues  to  be  the  major  staff  of  life, 
there  is  little  hope  for  foreign  agricultural  implements, 
and  the  buffalo  continues  to  wallow  through  the  flooded 
fields,  dragging  the  wooden  culti^'ator.  Hong-Kong  has 
erected  its  first  flour-mill,  however,  with  a capacity  of 
one  thousand  barrels  a day.  The  grain  will  be  brought 
eight  days  by  sea  from  Manchuria,  and  also  imported 
from  Oregon.  Electricity  developed  from  reservoirs  in 
the  hills  back  of  Junk  Bay,  eight  miles  from  Hong-Kong’s 
civic  center,  will  be  used.  Hong-Kong  has  not  supplied 
Vladivostock  and  Manchuria  since  the  Russian-Japanese 


312 


THE  CHINESE 


War.  She  has  been  devoting  her  abilities  to  supplying 
South  China  with  a low  grade  imported  Oregon  flour  at 
two  cents  a pound.  For  the  finer  festival  cakes,  the  Chi- 
nese have  of  late  been  importing  slightly  superior  Austra- 
lian and  Alberta  flours.  The  Chinese  does  not  yet  appre- 
ciate, or  at  least  he  could  not  pay  for  Minnesota  flour. 
At  Chin  Kiang  on  the  Grand  Canal,  there  is  another  na- 
tive flour-mill  which  rolls  a good  product  at  two  cents  a 
pound,  and  Shanghai  has  several  mills.  In  the  na- 
tive mills,  the  nether  stone  revolves,  while  the  upper  is 
stationary.  More  mills  will  certainly  be  erected,  and 
grain  be  brought  from  Manchuria,  the  West  River  in  the 
south,  and  across  the  Pacific.  The  former  unassailed 
position  of  rice,  we  are  glad  to  say,  is  now  doomed  to  be 
attacked.  The  native  cotton-mills,  located  at  Wuchang 
by  Viceroy  Chang,  are  manufacturing  all  the  uniforms 
for  the  new  Chinese  army  of  the  central  provinces. 

Land  is  leased  from  the  government,  and  the  right  of 
occupancy  is  evidenced  by  a Hung  Ki  or  red  deed,  but 
the  people  exchange  land  among  themselves  by  a private 
and  unregistered  white  deed,  because  they  wish  to  escape 
the  expense  of  the  government  deeds.  There  are  few 
suits  over  the  white  deeds,  which  speaks  volumes  for  the 
famed  honesty  of  the  Chinese  peasant.  When  new  land 
is  broken,  the  government  allows  six  crops  (two  seasons) 
to  be  reaped,  before  calling  for  the  first  taxes,  and  in 
times  of  famine  all  taxes  are  remitted.  Taxes  are  never 
over  fifty  cents  an  acre,  and  descend  to  ten  cents  an  acre 
for  hill  land.  China  exacts  no  direct  tax  in  Thibet.  She 
collects  yearly  a nominal  tribute  from  the  central  gov- 
ernment at  Lhassa.  Thibet,  however,  has  to  support 
the  resident  minister  sent  from  Peking.  Taxation  is  not 
always  collected  in  money,  but  sometimes  in  tithing  of 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  313 


produce,  the  rice  being  stored  in  government  granaries. 
China  is  the  only  country  that  in  this  way  is  repeating 
the  picturesque  history  of  Joseph  and  the  Pharaohs,  in 
the  storing  of  grain  against  famine  by  the  government. 
Americans  will  best  remember  the  five  granaries  at  Can- 
ton, and  the  even  larger  ones  at  Peking.  The  peasants 
of  China  do  not  bear  the  burdens  of  those  of  Japan, 
where  one-third  of  the  revenue  goes  to  the  government. 

There  are  few  additional  sources  of  revenue.  Provin- 
cially,  the  pawnshops’  licenses,  and  the  likin  on  transpor- 
tation help  out.  The  customs,  salt  excise,  and  the  loti 
(tea  export  duty)  further  assist  the  general  government. 
A citizen  of  China  can  boast  of  enjoying  two  of  the 
several  essentials  of  liberty,  that  to  be  well  governed  is 
to  hear  little  of  it,  and  pay  little  for  it.  When  China’s 
mines  are  sunk,  and  her  factories  are  erected,  she  can 
afford  one  of  the  heaviest  budgets  in  the  world,  pro- 
vided the  people  continue  in  their  individual  economic 
habits  and  temperance.  She  owes  her  vast  population 
to  two  causes : low  taxation  and  early  marriages.  A 
reorganization  in  the  system  of  collection  could  yield 
the  government  even  now  two  hundred  and  ten  millions 
from  the  land  tax;  the  customs  yield  of  about  twenty- 
five  millions  could  be  brought  up  to  one  hundred  millions 
if  likin  was  absolutely  wiped  out.  The  loti,  as  well  as 
the  likin  tax  should  be  abolished.  Government  royalties 
on  mining,  and  the  receipts  from  railways,  could  bring 
up  the  revenue  of  China  to  the  enormous  amount  of  five 
hundred  millions  a year,  without  making  the  poor  of 
the  land  poorer,  and  it  must  be  remembered  that  life  is 
decreed,  or  a knell  sounded,  for  a state,  as  it  turns  on 
this  one  problem:  will  the  poor  be  made  poorer  or  the 
rich  richer?  They  can  not  both  be  made  richer  and  either 


3H 


THE  CHINESE 


live,  as  is  the  fatuous  statement  to-day  of  certain  of 
our  “ endowed  ” professors  of  economics. 

There  are  Building  and  Loan  Associations  in  China, 
called  Tei  Po  Wui  (Spread  on  the  Ground  Associa- 
tions) because  the  historic  founder  who  first  borrowed 
from  his  friends  was  so  poor  that  he  had  neither  hut  nor 
bench  where  to  ask  them  to  sit  while  the  loan  should  be 
discussed. 

The  government’s  salt  monopoly  is  a great  burden 
upon  a people  who  require  so  much  of  the  staple  for  one 
of  their  main  foods,  fish.  Indeed,  in  oriental  countries 
where  icing  is  not  yet  practical,  the  necessity  of  salt  and 
sugar  as  preservatives  is  imperative.  The  cost  averages 
throughout  the  empire  two  cents  a pound,  whereas  it 
should  be  sold  for  half  that.  The  monopoly  mainly  cov- 
ers evaporation  privileges  along  the  sea-coast,  and  the 
product  being  granular,  is  not  so  good  as  the  residue 
from  boiling.  These  sea-water  beds  are  all  in  the  north- 
ern provinces.  Evaporation  is  permitted  when  three 
inches  of  water  are  pumped  into  the  vast  basins.  The 
salt  is  packed  in  five  hundred  pound  mats.  This  un- 
purified salt  accounts  partially  for  the  rank  smells  of  the 
dried  fish-markets.  When  the  Indian  government  re- 
duced the  salt  tax  ten  millions  a year,  the  progress  of 
India  commenced,  until  her  solvency  is  now  assured. 
Poor  China  is  praying  for  similar  relief.  In  the  toe  of 
northern  Shensi  Province,  is  situated  the  ancient  and  re- 
markable walled  salt  lake,  fifty  miles  square,  which  sup- 
ports a Civil  Service  city  of  seventy-five  thousand 
inhabitants,  who  tend  the  pans  for  the  government. 
Many  more  salt  and  brackish  springs  could  be  reclaimed 
at  this  point.  At  similar  springs  at  Fung  Tu  in  Szechuen 
Province,  natural  gas  is  piped  in  hollowed  bamboos  to 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  315 


the  pans.  No  salt  is  imported.  The  present  consump- 
tion in  the  empire  is  the  tremendous  amount  of  one  mil- 
lion, nine  hundred  thousand  metric  tons.  Junks  seized 
in  the  act  of  salt  smuggling  are  drawn  up  on  the  shore 
or  bank  and  sawn  in  twain,  as  a melancholy  deterrent  of 
similar  delinquency.  The  Chinese  dearly  loves  his  ethics 
in  pictures,  and  the  government  seizes  the  eloquent  op- 
portunity. 

M’here  wood  is  scarce  and  paper  so  necessary,  the  sup- 
ply of  pulp  is  becoming  a matter  of  anxiety.  Expecta- 
tion is  turned  toward  the  bamboo  (Kam  Li)  which  grows 
as  much  as  five  feet  in  a night  until  a growth  of  fifty  feet 
is  attained  in  the  humid  southern  provinces.  What  more 
need  we  say  for  the  soil  of  China?  Planted  as  a hedge 
between  the  rice  fields,  it  frames  as  soft  and  alluring  a 
scene  as  the  imagination  can  paint.  How  wonderful  this 
plant,  which  furnishes  in  its  tender  shoots  and  seeds,  food 
for  man ; in  its  larger  growth,  poles  for  his  hut  and  masts 
for  his  junks;  in  its  fiber,  paper  for  his  kettles  and  print- 
ing press;  and  medicine  in  the  silicious  nodules  of  the 
joints!  It  is  split  into  fibers  in  Korea,  lacquered  black, 
and  woven  into  the  astounding  hats  which  the  quality  of 
that  land  wear.  It  is  wound  to  make  the  immense  haw- 
sers which  pull  the  boats  through  the  Ichang  Gorge  of  the 
Yangtze,  and  which  suspend  the  bridges  over  the  gorges 
between  Thibet  and  Szechuen  Province. 

The  stalks  of  the  two-year-old  bamboo,  cut  into  one- 
inch  lengths,  are  thrown  into  a pond  or  clay  vat,  where 
they  are  allowed  to  decompose  for  four  months.  An  oily 
scum  collects  on  the  top,  which  is  discarded,  but  some  day 
it  will  be  purified  and  used  commercially.  The  pulp  is 
then  pounded  by  hydraulic  or  hand  hammers.  A bind- 
ing material,  made  from  the  leaves  of  the  holly-like  Ac- 


3i6 


THE  CHINESE 


tinidia  or  Lauraceae,  is  mixed  in,  and  the  paper  is  cut, 
dried  and  pressed  into  the  sizes  desired.  The  Japanese 
have  already  erected  at  Toroku  in  Fonnosa,  an  irnmense 
modern  paper-mill,  which  uses  bamboo  entirely  as  staple. 
The  so-called  velvety  but  frailer  “ rice-paper,”  used  for 
those  dainty  little  paintings,  with  humorous  Pidgin 
verses,  at  Canton,  is  only  the  pith  of  the  Fatsia  elder  of 
the  Yunnan  marshes,  the  cells  of  which  are  cut  length- 
wise and  ironed.  Into  so  many  lines  of  industry  does 
the  bamboo  enter,  that  lacking  as  yet  the  production  of 
iron  and  lumber,  the  plant  may  be  said  to  be  the  frame- 
work of  China.  Throughout  Kiangsi  Province,  it  is 
used  to  construct  the  water-wheels  of  the  irrigation  canals. 
Even  saucepans  and  kettles  are  made  of  the  compressed 
pulp,  which  is  treated  with  secret  salts.  The  pans,  how- 
ever, must  be  kept  nearly  full  of  water,  which  is  brought 
to  a boil  with  surprising  rapidity.  Medium  sized  bamboo 
has  been  introduced  on  Bainbridge  Island,  Washington 
State,  and  has  reached  a growth  of  five  feet.  If  this  at- 
tempt of  the  Furuyas  firm  is  successful  in  furniture 
making,  they  will  introduce  the  lumber  bamboo,  in  which 
America  has  an  opportunity  to  relieve  the  destruction 
of  her  forests  throughout  the  southern  states. 

On  foot-power  looms,  in  their  own  homes,  the  Chinese 
weave  three  hundred  different  patterns  of  silk  and  satin 
goods.  Most  entrancing  are  the  embroidered  goods,  on 
which  a woman  (often  the  deserted  wife  of  an  opium 
fiend)  will  work  a month  and  receive  three  dollars.  The 
merchant  will  sell  you  this  mandarin’s  robe,  with  its 
Greek-like  spangles  of  geometrical  patterns,  or  its  orna- 
ments of  trellises,  chrysanthemums,  fruit  or  butterflies, 
for  fifteen  dollars.  W ere  you  to  sell  it  in  your  own  land, 
you  would  receive  one  hundred  dollars.  That  robe  will 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  317 


be  exhibited  in  homes  and  galleries.  Its  pattern  will 
teach  industries  to  our  art  schools.  Over  the  world  the 
power  of  its  beauty  will  spread.  But  whatever  commer- 
cially results,  or  lesthetically  emanates  from  the  creation, 
nothing  whatever  will  reach  that  woman  of  Hang-chow, 
who  received  her  all  in  the  three  dollars.  To  the  altar  of 
art  the  women  of  China  have  bound  themselves  that 
beauty  may  not  die.  The  world  piles  up  its  debts,  even 
though  the  piling  up  be  done  in  secret  places  in  neglected 
lands.  The  death  of  a generation  can  not  outlaw  them. 
Some  day  we  shall  have  to  pay  that  woman  of  Hang- 
chow, or  her  heirs  of  suffering,  what  we  ow^e  her,  just  as, 
for  one  instance,  the  labor  unions  of  England  are  now  col- 
lecting what  their  forefathers  owed  Wat  Tyler  and  his 
Kentishmen,  when  they  commandeered  their  arms,  their 
service  and  their  poll-taxed  bodies  in  1381,  without  rec- 
ompense. 

The  United  States  does  not  produce  one-third  of  the 
wool  she  requires  and  she  therefore  draws  on  North 
China  for  nearly  three  million  dollars’  worth  a year, 
which  is  about  China’s  complete  exportation  of  the 
product.  The  export  is,  of  course,  through  the  port  of 
Tientsin. 

On  the  iron  hills  around  Canton  and  Macao,  you  wnll 
notice  drying  in  the  sun,  the  delightfully  soft  grass  linen 
which  has  been  dyed  with  the  blue  “ Polygonum  tinc- 
torium.”  If  you  w^ander  into  the  sheds  where  the  silk- 
worms are  feeding,  they  will  beseech  you  to  make  no 
noise,  this  odd  requirement  being  quite  necessary  in  seri- 
culture. If  the  raising  and  feeding  of  the  grub  are  tedi- 
ous, the  procuring  of  the  skein  from  the  cocoon  is  simplic- 
ity itself.  Let  us  enter  a reeler’s  house.  There  is  no  un- 
necessary furniture  in  the  working-room.  On  the  adobe 


THE  CHINESE 


318 

floor  lie  the  bits  of  charcoal  and  precious  pieces  of  drift- 
wood gathered  from  every  nook  of  the  fields  and  canal. 
There  is  the  bamboo  basket  which  brought  them,  and  a 
tray  where  he  assorts  the  cocoons.  The  skein  itself 
makes  the  circumference  around  two  crossed  frames 
which  revolve.  The  fire  pot  is  of  stone  and  is  without  a 
door.  It  rests  on  a rock.  The  Han-yang  copper  pot  is 
wide  and  shallow.  Into  it  the  cocoons  are  thrown  with  a 
wooden  spoon.  With  his  right  hand  the  reeler  works 
four  or  five  to  the  edge,  gathers  deftly  the  ends  of  five  wet 
threads  and  lets  the  cocoons  drop  back  into  the  hot  water. 

In  the  ancient  Portuguese  settlement  of  Macao  you  pass 
the  lofty  Boa  Vista  Hotel,  with  its  Renaissance  beauty 
alien  enough  here,  and  saunter  westward  along  the  Rua 
de  Penha,  beneath  the  hill  toward  which  Portuguese  navi- 
gators for  five  centuries  have  looked  for  succor.  On 
each  side  of  you  are  high  walls,  cut  with  gates  which  bear 
noble  white  stucco  ornaments,  and  arms  above  them,  and 
a wonderful  iron  lamp  which  looks  more  like  the  art  of 
crusaders  than  the  hand-work  of  Chinese.  You  pass  Fort 
Bomparto,  erected  by  Lopez  Carrasco  in  1615.  At  your 
feet  is  a small  half-moon  bay  as  blue  as  Naples;  at  the 
other  horn  is  the  fort  of  Sao  Thiago  de  Barra,  with  its 
big-bellied  cannon,  obsolete,  but  delightfully  quaint. 
There  are  home-cast  copper  cannon,  too,  and  blue-domed 
white  sentry  boxes,  which  look  more  like  lighthouses  of  a 
miniature  past.  You  are  recalling  the  Dutch  invasion 
which  was  repulsed  on  this  silver  beach  in  1622.  If  you 
can  evade  a cordon  of  yellow  chow  dogs,  every  one  of 
which  you  would  like  to  take  home  as  a prize,  you  will 
reach  a series  of  terraces,  on  each  of  which  are  crowded 
dozens  of  huts.  This  is  the  ancient  village  of  the  native 
fire-cracker  makers.  Take  up  some  of  the  torn  paper 


The  Manchu  Regent  of  China.  Prince  Chun,  brother  of  tne  late 
Emperor.  Kwang  Su.  and  father  of  infant  Emperor- 
elect  Hsuan  Tung. 


6oo  miles  inland  at  Hankow,  Central  China.  The  Yang-tze  and 
Han  rivers,  which  meet  here,  rise  forty  feet  in  the  s])ring 
floods,  Hankow  is  the  Pittsburg  of  China,  for  here 
meet  the  o])ulent  antimony,  coal  and  iron  beds  of 
Hupeh  province.  It  is  also  the  center  of  the 
black  tea  trade,  and  the  head  of  deep  water 
navigation  on  the  Yang-tze  river. 


1 he  busy  .Metropolis  of  ( 'hin;i.  Canton,  as  seen  from  the  I long  Koiii 
boat  wliari.  Canton  has  had  an  nninterrupted  trade  with 
foiadgncrs  for  450  years,  desi)itc  the  intriguing 
ot  Peking  to  end  tlu-  intercourse. 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  319 


lying  about,  which  is  used  for  stuffing  the  crackers.  The 
text  is  in  Chinese,  and  the  translation  reveals  the  fulmina- 
tions  of  Amos  against  the  heathen,  copies  of  which  have 
been  handed  out  in  thousands  by  the  Christian  colpor- 
teurs. Buckwheat  paste  is  rolled  in  the  fuse;  straw  and 
every  possible  refuse  is  used  to  make  the  cheap  paper. 
Each  child  or  woman  prepares  two  thousand  five  hundred 
crackers  a day,  for  which  she  receives  ten  cents.  More 
of  the  earth  of  China  is  scattered  over  the  Americas  than 
the  soil  of  all  other  lands  together.  Chinese  humorists 
say  they  are  anointing  us  unto  the  conquest.  The  middle 
and  ends  of  each  fire-cracker  are  sealed  with  Chinese  red 
clay.  In  China,  however,  the  fire-cracker  is  only  used 
in  religious  ritual,  for  the  purpose  of  frightening  away 
evil  spirits. 

Where  a stream,  now  almost  dried  up,  once  rushed 
between  the  loess  foot-hills  of  Kowloon,  across  the  bay 
from  Hong-Kong,  is  situated  a village  of  soy-makers. 
The  stream  has  sunk  down  from  a dozen  levels  as  the 
forests  which  fed  it  have  been  uprooted  at  its  source,  until 
now  it  whispers  deep  in  a sunken  gorge.  From  terrace 
to  terrace,  the  high  bamboo  water-wheels  patiently  feed 
the  irrigation  bamboo  and  mud  troughs.  There  are  two 
narrow  terraces  on  each  side  of  the  highest  level.  Above 
are  the  hills  with  their  waving  camphor-trees.  Behind 
the  bamboo  fences  you  will  notice  the  bean  poles,  and  the 
great  earthenware  pots,  where  the  bean  liquor  is  fer- 
mented, and  stirred  for  two  months  in  the  blazing  sun 
until  it  is  black.  The  beans  are  skinned  and  made  into 
a flour,  into  which  gypsum  is  mixed.  Salt  and  secret 
things  are  added  to  make  this  appetizing  soy,  which  those 
who  have  learned  the  taste  prefer  to  the  flavored  Worces- 
tershire, of  which  it  is  the  base.  The  soy  costs  only  a 


320 


THE  CHINESE 


trifle,  and  the  workman  who  earns  only  ten  cents  a day 
will  have  it  at  his  meal.  The  wealthy  are  equally  proud 
of  their  national  “ abettor  of  appetite.” 

An  odd  pursuit  on  the  plateaus  of  western  Szechuen 
Province  is  the  gathering  of  musk,  which  is  worth  more 
than  its  weight  in  gold.  The  product  comes  from  a gland 
in  the  stomach  of  the  hornless  deer,  which  stands  only 
twenty  inches  high,  and  whose  habitat  is  never  lower 
than  eight  thousand  feet. 

In  computing  the  future  of  Chinese  exports,  one  must 
consider  the  eight  million  Chinese  abroad,  who  are  be- 
coming wealthier,  and  are  sending  to  their  native  land 
for  the  things  to  which  they  have  been  used,  and  which 
they  passionately  love. 

Cornwall  and  Malay  were  supposed  to  contain  all  the 
deposits  of  the  world’s  tin  until  the  mines  of  Bolivia,  ten 
thousand  feet  up  the  Andes,  were  uncovered  recently.  It 
may  surprise  many  that  the  fastnesses  of  distant  Yun- 
nan Province  conceal  ancient  mines  at  Kuo  Chia,  which, 
working  on  the  most  primitive  methods  in  the  alluvial 
deposits  formed  by  erosion,  produce  to-day  one  hundred 
thousand  piculs  a year  (13,333,000  pounds),  valued  at 
twenty-two  cents  a pound  at  the  mines,  befoi’e  the  pay- 
ment of  the  export  loti  imposed  by  China.  These  mines 
are  near  the  Tonquin  border  and  the  proposed  French 
railway  which  will  have  one  Chinese  port  at  Pak  Hoi  will 
profit  by  the  carriage  of  this  freight,  which  now  is  ex- 
ported to  Hong-Kong.  The  tin  averages  as  high  as 
sixty-five  per  cent.,  there  being  little  wolfram  and  mis- 
pickel  in  the  ore,  which  is  run  through  sluices  after  the 
larger  stones  have  been  picked  out  of  the  muddy  gravel. 
The  metal  is  run  in  pigs  weighing  one  hundred  and  forty- 
six  pounds,  which  are  cut  in  half  for  convenience  in 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  321 


packing  on  donkey  back.  The  furnaces  consume  wood  as 
fuel.  The  blowing  apparatus  is  most  primitive.  Each 
coolie  worker  is  expected  to  produce  one  kilogram  of  tin 
a day.  Some  of  this  tin  is  used  at  Swatow  in  making 
the  celebrated  pewter  ware,  the  antimony  coming  from 
the  particularly  rich  mines  of  Hunan.  Changsha,  the 
capital  of  that  province,  has  two  native  smelting  estab- 
lishments, and  Carlowitz  and  Company,  the  well  known 
Hamburg  firm,  run  a large  smelting  plant  at  Wuchang. 

Ten  miles  from  the  British  military  and  sanitarium 
settlement  of  Wei-hai-wei,  five  hundred  feet  above  the 
sea,  shafts  have  been  sunk  by  foreign  companies  into 
oxidized  ore  which  carries  free  gold.  The  wages  paid 
muckers  are  fifteen  cents  gold,  and  miners  twenty  cents 
gold  a day.  The  native  miners  used  to  break  the  ore 
small  by  hand,  and  then  throw  it  into  a bean  mill  under 
stone  rollers.  The  free  gold  was  panned  out  by  the  use 
of  quicksilver.  The  rocks  of  the  neighborhood  are  of 
volcanic  origin,  traversed  by  seismic  intrusion,  and  also 
showing  signs  of  erosion. 

How  rapidly  the  spear  becomes  a share  is  evidenced 
already  on  the  Mongolian  and  Manchurian  steppes  ad- 
jacent to  the  Siberian  Railway.  They  expect  to  ship  five 
hundred  thousand  sheep  to  St.  Petersburg,  and  even  some 
to  London,  through  the  port  of  Riga  this  summer.  The 
disbanded  soldiers  of  Kuropatkin  are  throwing  away  their 
buttons,  importing  Austrian  enameled  cooking  ware,  and 
getting  to  work  between  the  furrows.  And  far  away  in 
Thibet,  where  the  red  banners  of  Younghusband  and  the 
yellow  ones  of  the  Lhama  made  their  kowtows,  they  have 
begun  a modern  cart  road  from  the  fertile  lake  regions 
over  the  passes  to  Simla.  Bullock  and  yak  wagons,  in- 
stead of  barrows,  are  now  bearing  out  pashum  (fine  shawl 


322 


THE  CHINESE 


wool  of  the  Thibetan  goat),  borax,  silk,  tea,  charras  and 
sulphur. 

We  have  said  that  the  roads  of  China  are  only  wide 
enough  for  a barrow,  on  which  the  load  is  generally  five 
hundred  pounds,  though  in  the  north  of  China  some  bar- 
rows  carry  one  thousand  pounds.  Of  several,  there  is 
one  venerable  exception,  dating  from  the  third  century, 
A.  D.,  and  when  there  is  an  exception  in  China,  it  is  on 
a gigantic  scale.  From  Peking  to  Ching  Too,  the  capital 
of  Szechuen,  a distance  of  one  thousand  five  hundred 
miles  through  the  most  populous  plain  of  China,  there 
runs  a road  built  one  thousand  five  hundred  years  ago. 
It  is  fifteen  feet  wide,  and  is  paved  with  large  blocks  of 
stone,  some  being  five  feet  square.  It  is,  of  course,  in 
wretched  condition,  taken  at  spots,  but  judged  as  a whole, 
there  lies  the  great  work  ready  for  easy  adjustment  to  the 
present  day.  The  ancient  cedars  stand  sentinel,  pointing 
piteously  to  a return  to  the  patriotic  public  works  of  yore 
by  taotais,  mandarins  and  viceroys.  The  fiiyiins 
(mayojs)  are  not  at  fault.  The  scenery,  where  this 
road  crosses  the  Sin  Ling  range,  is  on  the  most  stupen- 
dous scale,  Alpine  in  its  beauty.  The  engineers  cut  the 
road  at  eight  thousand  feet,  and  the  snowy  peaks 
tower  three  thousand  feet  still  higher.  If  one  may  judge 
,the  religion  of  the  Chinese  Buddhists  by  the  condition 
of  the  roads,  it  must  be  at  a low  ebb,  for  one  of  the  most 
neglected  of  the  Ten  Charities  is : “ He  who  makes  a 

piece  of  road  cuts  off  one  thousand  dots  on  the  debtor 
side  of  his  record  with  Buddha.”  Peking’s  streets,  those 
sloughs  of  dust,  pitfalls  or  slime,  have  lately  seen  their 
first  steam  roller.  Shanghai  and  Hong- Kong,  of  course, 
preceded  Peking  in  this  respect.  In  the  stone-paved  na- 
tive cities,  the  sewer  is  under  the  middle  row  of  slabs. 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  323 


As  the  flow  of  water  is  poor,  decaying  vegetable  matter 
makes  a malodorous  cry  to  heaven.  The  sewers  are 
used  for  no  other  filth,  however,  as  all  else  is  carried  to 
the  fields  in  buckets.  Chinese  civic  philosophy  is  thankful 
therefor,  considering  that  things  would  be  infinitely 
worse  if  the  fields  did  not  demand  more  fertilizer  than 
is  available.  There  is  not  an  American,  however,  who 
will  believe  this,  when  he  is  caught  rounding  a lee  corner 
for  the  first  time. 

Since  little  glass  is  manufactured  (and  that  only  at 
Canton),  and  as  porcelain  is  too  costly,  and  earthenware 
too  brittle  to  stand  the  jolting,  it  may  be  asked  how  their 
samschu  wine  and  valuable  oils  are  transported.  Large 
grass  baskets,  to  support  one  hundred  pounds  weight,  are 
prepared.  These  are  lined  with  thick  bamboo  paper, 
which  is  soaked  in  vegetable  oil.  Withes  of  strong  grass 
are  twisted  about  the  bundle,  and  also  around  the  large 
hood  which  is  placed  over  the  orifice.  The  coolie  takes 
no  risk  with  this  burden,  and  has  it  harnessed  on  a prop, 
so  that  he  does  not  have  to  put  the  bundle  down  each  time 
he  rests  against  a wall  or  tree. 

More  alleviating  even  than  railways  is  the  institution 
at  last  of  public  utilities  in  some  of  the  suffering  cities. 
This  is  really  the  breaking  of  the  true  dawn,  the  distinct 
form  of  the  sun  of  comfort  itself  seen  over  the  horizon 
at  last.  A contract  to  provide  Canton  with  water-works 
at  Tsang  To  has  been  awarded  to  a German  firm.  Up 
to  the  present.  Canton  has  taken  her  supply  from  the 
polluted  river  and  thousands  of  city  wells,  and  epidemics 
would  be  even  more  frequent  if  the  Chinese  did  not  take 
most  of  their  drink  in  boiled  tea.  The  second  city  to 
follow  is  at  the  other  end  of  the  land,  Newchwang  letting 
a similar  contract  to  a British  firm,  and  even  old  Peking 


324 


THE  CHINESE 


is  laying  down  pipes  to  bring  filtered  water  from  the  Sha 
and  Ching  Rivers.  We  know  what  Lourdes  is  in  relic 
week  as  a distributor  of  disease,  but  the  water  of  Chinese 
cities  holds  a continuous  carnival  in  germs.  When  the 
music  of  the  steam  water-pumps  is  heard  in  the  land, 
how  many  millions  will  rise  upon  their  couches  and  say 
they  have  heard  indeed  the  pulsing  of  the  wings  of  that 
good  angel  which  shed  healing  upon  the  West.  The  ob- 
ject lesson  was  afforded  by  the  filtration  beds  at  Tokio, 
Osaka  and  British  Hong-Kong.  Families  too  poor  to 
pay  for  a faucet  in  the  house  are  furnished  a key  to  the 
street  hydrant  for  seventy-five  cents  per  annum,  with  the 
liability  of  being  swooped  down  upon  by  the  patrolling 
lukong  if  water  is  wasted. 

Harbors,  too,  are  being  improved.  It  is  proposed  to 
prepare  the  water-front  of  historic  Whompoa  for  Can- 
ton’s revived  shipping,  and  the  railway  terminal  which 
will  be  located  there.  Even  the  dizzy  old  bund  of  Canton 
itself  has  lately  been  straightened  up  before  the  surveyor’s 
line.  But  the  other  day,  two  towns  off  the  Tung  Ting 
Lake  opened  their  black-barred  gates  to  foreign  trade,  and 
the  vast  hemp  fields  of  sealed  Hunan  were  thus  at  last 
brought  to  one  day’s  steaming  from  Han-kau. 

The  foolish  pounding  on  a wooden  cymbal  by  a watch- 
man who  noisily  dragged  along  his  wooden  shoes  through 
the  thief-infested  shadows  is  being  replaced  by  the  stealthy 
tread  of  the  uniformed,  carbine-armed  policeman. 
Drained  boulevards  are  being  broken  across  the  stinking 
cities  from  gate  to  gate.  Something  more  systematic 
than  the  visits  of  the  wandering  sow  is  depended  upon 
to  clean  the  streets  of  garbage.  More  victorias  and  auto- 
mobiles, full  of  happy  painted  wives,  are  seen,  as  wider 
roads  are  macadamized  in  the  suburbs  of  the  treaty 


MODERN  COMMERCE  AND  BUSINESS  325 


ports.  Copied  from  Hong-Kong,  the  great  teacher  of 
the  East,  the  electric  car  will  run  before  long  out  of  Can- 
ton, up  the  gorgeous  West  River  (Sikiang)  country. 
Honest  China  has  at  last  allowed  her  impeccable  self  to 
loot  the  Occident  of  its  inventions,  for  the  sake  of  the  re- 
lief it  will  give  her  tired  sons  who  were  almost  buried 
in  the  dirt  of  the  centuries. 


VIII 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES  OF  SOUTH  CHINA 

The  stricken  British  island-colony  of  Hong-Kong  has 
learned  to  welcome  those  recognized  experts,  the  Japanese 
doctors,  in  the  annual  visitation  of  the  terrible  bubonic 
plague,  called  by  the  Chinese,  Chang-chih.  How  its 
recurrence  shrinks  history!  We  read  of  the  curse  first 
in  I Samuel,  6.4;  in  Thucydides,  as  occurring  at  Athens 
in  594,  B.  C. ; and  at  Rome  in  the  reign  of  Justinian,  A. 
D„  542.  We  have  even  considered  Manzoni’s  descrip- 
tion of  it  at  Milan,  and  Defoe’s  and  Pepys’  accounts  of 
the  “Black  Death  ” in  London  in  September,  1665,  as 
ancient  history.  But  here  is  the  veritable  monster,  viru- 
lent and  steaming,  suddenly  barring  one’s  path  this  very 
day.  A Japanese,  Kita  Sato,  discovered  the  bacillus  in 
the  epidemic  at  Hong-Kong  in  1894,  and  since  then,  the 
Japanese  physicians  have  been  invited  to  Canton,  Bom- 
bay, Singapore  and  Manila  when  those  ports  are  visited 
by  their  annual  scourges.  The  Chinese  of  Hong-Kong 
call  it  Wan  Yik  (the  epidemic),  in  painful  recollection 
of  the  blowing  up  by  the  British  soldiers  in  1894  of  the 
vast  Taeping  Shan  section,  which  hole  lies  under  the 
beetling  brows  of  Victoria  and  Davis  Peaks. 

The  most  marked  contrast  between  China  and  Japan, 
therefore,  is  not  in  arms,  manufacturing,  or  shipping, 
astonishing  as  have  been  the  achievements  in  these  re- 
spects, but  in  the  splendid  modernity  of  the  latter  nation 
in  sanitary  accomplishments.  Of  a verity,  when  we 

326 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES 


327 


speak  of  plague,  angels  have  come  upon  earth  and  the 
Haran  of  visitation  this  time  has  been  in  heathen  Nippon. 
China,  of  course,  has  never  equaled  Bombay  in  the  viru- 
lence of  the  plague,  although  in  the  1894  epidemic,  thirty- 
five  thousand  died  at  Canton  alone.  Even  in  the  cool 
season.  Canton  has  never  less  than  forty  deaths  a week. 
In  the  neighboring  province  of  Yunnan  it  is  probably 
raging  in  many  a damp,  mephitic  valley  when  the  medical 
journals  are  claiming  that  at  last  the  earth,  so  far  as 
newspaper  knowledge  goes,  is  enjoying  a respite  from  the 
curse,  as  seemed  to  be  the  case  between  the  years  1844 
and  1873.  Of  late  Hong-Kong,  which  has  a native  popu- 
lation of  three  hundred  thousand,  has  averaged  three 
hundred  deaths  a year,  and  from  January  to  September, 
1906,  the  Colony  sufifered  nine  hundred  deaths  from 
plague.  Cases  recur  among  the  Europeans  of  the  Colony 
every  third  year.  It  is  remarkable  how  plague  clings  to 
a house.  After  a long  respite  the  scourge  broke  out  in 
1901  in  a beautiful  Arcade  opposite  the  Hong-Kong  Bank 
on  Queen’s  Road,  a European  being  attacked.  Do  what 
the  sanitary  board  will,  each  year  it  has  returned  until 
the  house  has  come  to  be  called  “ The  Row  of  a Hundred 
Shudders.”  Surprisingly  the  government  has  permitted 
plague  corpses  to  be  buried  at  Cheung  Sha  Wan  on  the 
slopes  of  Mount  Davis,  in  immediate  touch  with  the  for- 
eign life  of  the  Colony,  This  cemetery  of  ten  thousand 
tiny  stakes  and  round  mounds,  is  just  above  a section  of 
the  noble  Victoria  Jubilee  Road,  which  sweeps  half  round 
the  island,  thirty  feet  above  the  water,  and  winds  in  and 
out  of  a dozen  bays  through  Pokfulum  as  far  as  Aber- 
deen. Anchored  beneath  the  Chinese  cemetery,  swings 
around  her  buoy,  the  white  bulk  Hygeia  (an  old  war 
vessel  of  Nelson’s  time),  terri’ole  to  many  a European 


328 


THE  CHINESE 


with  memories  of  the  fevered  struggle  with  the  plague, 
the  only  alleviation  for  which  seems  to  be  copious 
drafts  of  brandy  in  the  intent  to  stimulate  the  action 
of  the  heart,  which  is  immediately  depressed  by  the  poison 
of  the  plague.  The  Chinese  administer  musk,  hoangnan 
tea  and  rhubarb,  and  sometimes  lance  the  bubo.  Among 
the  natives  ninety  per  cent,  die,  but  with  the  more  highly 
vitalized,  meat-fed  foreigners,  seventy  per  cent,  recover. 
As  is  to  be  expected  in  mixed  bloods,  one  hundred  per 
cent,  of  the  Eurasians  attacked,  succumb.  The  first  in- 
dication is  an  eruption  under  the  arm  pit,  or  a swelling 
in  the  groin.  Almost  immediately  a great  weakness  en- 
sues, followed  by  delirium.  The  only  vanquisher  of  the 
bacillus  is  sunlight.  A germ  has  been  known  to  live  two 
centuries  at  Haarlem  in  Holland,  and  at  last  attack  the 
workmen  who  opened  the  tomb  of  a sailor. 

When  the  plague  becomes  epidemic  the  villagers  of 
Kwangtung,  following  the  principle  of  the  segregation 
of  the  healthy  and  not  the  diseased,  desert  their  houses 
and  make  a pitiful  pilgrimage  to  the  hills,  where  they 
erect  bamboo  matsheds.  Rats,  ants,  pigeons,  cats  and 
fleas,  all  die  of  the  disease,  and  spread  the  bacillus  among 
humans  from  towels,  plates  or  food,  and  humans  spread 
it  among  themselves  from  expectoration  and  contact. 
Above  all,  the  disease-soaked  earth  of  the  cities,  undrained 
of  filth  for  thousands  of  years,  breathes  out  the  plague  in 
the  dark,  rainy  and  prostratingly  hot  May  days.  In 
Hong-Kong,  excavation  is  prohibited  from  May  till  Oc- 
tober. 

During  the  prevalence  of  the  plague  in  Amoy  in  June, 
1907,  the  inhabitants  proceeded  to  Kulang-su  Island,  and 
secured  the  idol  of  Shing  Hsien  Kung,  which  is  named 
after  a famous  doctor  now  canonized  by  the  Buddhists. 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES  329 

The  Emperor  at  the  last  procession  ten  years  ago,  gave 
the  name  of  “ Hsu  Chen  Jen  ” (Genuine  Fairy  Healer) 
to  the  idol.  You  immediately  noticed  that  the  procession 
was  not  a gala  one,  by  the  unusual  feature  of  horsemen 
being  dressed  to  represent  gods.  The  taotai  loaned  his 
new  military  liveried  band  of  drums  and  fifes,  which 
alternated  with  the  usual  strings,  tom-toms  and  horns. 
Then,  of  course,  followed  the  characteristic  chairs  of 
fluttering  silk  and  glistening  tinsel ; tables  of  food  for  the 
gods;  bribes  for  the  devils  most  conspicuous  of  all;  and 
noble  umbrellas  and  day  lanterns. 

The  new  method  of  treating  plague  clothing,  long  fol- 
lowed on  the  hulk  Stanfield  in  Hong-Kong  harbor, 
is  now  practised  throughout  Japan,  on  the  suggestion  of 
Doctor  Hayaki  of  the  Kencho  Board.  A steam  generator 
and  retort  with  trays  are  rolled  into  a house.  Steam  is 
forced  at  great  pressure  through  the  clothing  and  bedding 
for  half  an  hour.  The  method  is  simple,  effective  and 
non-destructive,  for  the  natives  have  few  leather  posses- 
sions to  be  injured.  The  loss  of  clothing  and  bedding 
two  or  three  times  a year  by  the  former  methods  came 
to  be  a confiscation  as  much  feared  as  the  epidemic  itself. 
Japanese  crews,  ever  insistent  that  they  have  rights  over 
other  eastern  races,  have  always  been  rebellious  to  per- 
mitting their  effects  to  be  steamed.  I have  seen  them 
charge  the  Chinese  crew  of  the  Stanfield  with  knives, 
even  under  the  turbanned  brows  of  British  law  in  Hong- 
Kong. 

The  health  of  these  sub-tropical,  coastal  cities  is  some- 
what ameliorated  by  the  most  violent  typhonic  rain-storms 
which  sink  much  of  the  fetid  malarial  matter  or  chang- 
chi  far  into  the  ground. 

.White  ants  work  as  insidiously  as  the  causes  of  earth- 


330 


THE  CHINESE 


quakes,  and  as  suddenly,  when  the  timbers  are  perforated, 
bring  the  floors  tumbling  to  the  earth.  In  Canton,  more 
care  is  now  being  taken  to  seal  the  beams  and  rafters  with 
tin.  Ceilings  are  perforated,  often  in  beautiful  designs, 
as  the  ants  are  less  destructive  where  air  is  admitted  be- 
tween the  floors  and  the  ceilings.  The  pest  arrives  on 
the  wings  of  the  night  like  a cloud,  and  storms  your  win- 
dow if  the  light  is  burning.  The  wings  are  immediately 
molted  and  they  crawl  away  on  their  mission  of  de- 
struction. At  the  season  of  flight,  wei  would  set  a light 
in  a tub  of  water  and  darken  the  remainder  of  the  house. 
The  pests  would  stream  to  this  ignis  fatuus,  and  in  this 
way  thousands  were  lured  to  a moat  of  destruction,  as 
the  flame  clipped  their  wings.  The  bite  of  these  insects 
is  another  feature  of  their  unpopularity,  though  not 
equaled  by  the  fright  that  they  reach  you  on  wings  and 
explore  your  neck  and  arms  as  reptiles. 

Even  within  the  pale  of  civilization  at  Hong-Kong,  a 
pedestrian  on  Bowen,  Barker  or  Plantation  Roads  need 
not  be  surprised  to  encounter  a five-foot  cobra  or  a green 
viper,  and  on  the  lonelier  roads  to  Taitam  and  Stanley, 
twelve-foot  pythons  make  their  slimy  way  up  the  bank 
from  the  ferny  undergrowth.  The  natives  on  the  Kow- 
loon side  fear  most  the  six-inch  Teet  Sien  She,  which 
drops  on  their  wide  Hupeh  hats  with  a thud  from  the 
tiled  eaves  of  the  stone  houses. 

The  white  man  for  the  tropics  is  the  wiry,  lanky,  in- 
dividual. Pie  is  already  too  thin  for  antemia.  He  should 
look  like  a veteran  of  amoebic  dysentery  campaigns,  but 
be  innocent  of  the  experience.  He  certainly  can  not  grow 
apoplectic.  His  complexion  should  incline  to  the  swarthy, 
as  those  best  resist  the  actinic  rays  of  the  sun.  Squalls 
of  the  nerves,  and  typhonic  centers  of  melancholia,  he 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES 


331 


will  weather,  and  ride  out  on  an  even  keel  in  his  third 
year.  Thereafter,  the  three  rocks  he  must  chart  are: 
the  yellow  girl,  typanic  airs  on  a number-man’s  “ screw  ” 
(salary),  and  the  reiterated  “peg.”  But  perhaps  it  is 
plainer  to  say  that  it  takes  a genius  to  withstand  the 
tropics  and  sub-tropics,  and  he  must  be  born.  The  band 
who  rove  the  East  find  their  discoveries  as  melancholy 
to-day  as  did  the  followers  of  Camoens’  hero,  Da  Gama, 
to  whom : “ a grave  was  the  first  and  awful  sight  of 
every  shore.”  Certainly  three-quarters  of  those  who  ad- 
venture float  out  on  the  tide  again  as  dead  culls.  Many 
a good  fellow’s  ignorance  has  stranded  him  in  the  melan- 
choly little  cemetery  at  the  foot  of  the  White  Cloud  Hills 
at  Canton;  in  the  old  Portuguese  cemetery  outside  the 
West  Gate  of  Peking;  in  the  yellow-walled  cemetery  on 
the  Wong  Nei  Chong  (Happy  Valley)  Road  at  Hong- 
Kong,  in  casteless  comraderie  with  the  blue  ghosts  of  Par- 
sees;  behind  the  fort-like  walls  of  that  square  graveyard 
of  the  missionaries  that  crowns  the  height  over  the  Areia 
Preta  beach  at  Macao, — or  in  a similar  banishment  of  his 
white  man’s  soul  in  the  suburbs  of  many  another  treaty 
port.  Unquestionably  those  who  retire  come  away  with 
weakened  eyes,  liver,  spleen,  or  blood,  but  these  disabili- 
ties are  merely  physical ; they  have  gained  in  heart,  in  a 
broader  comprehension  of  all  human  kind,  “ Cingalee, 
Chinee,  and  Portugee  ” ; caste,  half-caste,  and  outcast.  It 
should  be  understood,  however,  that  he  does  not  reach  all 
these  conclusions  while  he  is  in  the  turmoil  and  the  chas- 
tening sweat,  but  from  the  better  perspective  of  his  ancient 
and  native  heath,  which  he  a thousand  times  despaired  of 
ever  reaching.  As  a Chinese  sage  says,  “ Appreciations 
come  by  contrast,  and  experiences  are  the  ladder  of 
Truth.”  I never  knew  a foreigner  in  the  southern  Chi- 


332 


THE  CHINESE 


nese  ports  who  did  not  languish  for  nine  months  of  his 
first  two  years  in  sickness.  Saigon  and  Bangkok  have 
even  a less  enviable  name  than  Shanghai,  Nanking  and 
Hong-Kong.  Hong-Kong,  with  miseries  enough  of  its 
own,  is  not,  however,  productive  of  the  pulmonary 
troubles  that  are  prevalent  farther  north  at  Peking, 
Ningpo,  and  even  Shanghai,  where  great  changes  fall 
suddenly. 

The  physicians  of  Hong-Kong  are  associated  into  part- 
nerships and  have  splendid  suites  of  offices  in  the  large 
buildings  on  the  Praya  front.  A large  part  of  their 
lucrative  practice  consists  in  answering  messages  from 
foreigners  taken  ill  inland  in  China,  directing  them  to  the 
proper  remedies  in  their  medicine  chests  to  relieve  the 
symptoms  which  they  have  telegraphed.  There  is  prob- 
ably nothing  as  unique  as  this  in  medical  practice  any- 
where else  in  the  world. 

It*is  proposed  to  segregate  the  ten  thousand  slowly 
rotting  lepers  of  Canton  into  lazarettoes  in  the  canal- 
moated  territory  round  about.  In  the  province  there  are 
twenty  thousand  more  untended  wretches,  and  in  the 
whole  country  three  hundred  thousand.  The  disease  is 
most  prevalent  in  the  damp,  hot  South,  and  especially  in 
the  silk  villages.  It  does  not  seem  to  increase  with  the 
population;  there  have  always  seemed  to  be  about  the 
same  number  in  the  land.  Subscriptions  are  asked  for 
the  segregation  camps,  one  cash  (one-twelfth  of  a cent) 
a day  being  deemed  sufficient  to  keep  one  person.  As  it 
is  now,  they  come  into  unpleasant  proximity  to  their  fel- 
lows. I once  took  a powerful  launch  and  passed  through 
some  of  the  canals  south  of  Canton  in  the  Heungshan 
district  between  the  Pearl  and  West  Rivers.  The  water 
teems  with  boat  life  and  duck  farms.  Wending  among 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES 


333 


it  all  were  the  lepers,  with  distorted  hands  sculling  their 
boats  against  the  tide.  A gong  was  displayed,  but  it  was 
too  difficult  to  strike  it.  Some  trusted  to  their  appear- 
ance to  have  alms  tossed  to  them.  Others  held  up  a cup 
which  was  tied  to  the  end  of  a bamboo.  Silently  up  and 
down  they  went,  beating  out  the  short,  fateful  strokes 
against  the  hour  of  death.  Those  who  had  no  hands  or 
feet  to  row,  laid  on  the  deck,  using  their  eyes  or  their 
lungs,  but  otherwise  appearing  as  castaway,  dismembered 
bodies  of  breathing  humanity,  pitiable  and  revolting  to 
look  upon. 

A charitable  Chinawoman, — a Hakka  of  the  boat 
class,  with  unbound  feet  and  wearing  a flapping  veil 
on  her  hat,  is  seen  coming  along  the  tow-path  by  the 
canal.  A leper  has  placed  his  jug  in  the  middle  of  the 
path.  He  has  no  hands  or  feet,  and  rolls  and  crawls  back 
from  the  path.  The  woman  approaches,  and  drops  in  the 
alms.  The  mortal  eyes,  with  supra-mortal  gleam  because 
of  the  spiritual  accession  which  comes  of  suffering,  flash 
out  a thanks  and  a blessing  and  an  assurance  of  pity,  that 
he  will  not  roll  back  to  the  cup  until  she  is  safely  passed. 
When  she  is  gone,  he  works  toward  the  food,  and  grasps 
it  in  his  teeth,  feeding  like  the  animal  that  mortal  misery 
can  make  of  any  of  us.  Where  charity  is  spread  thinner 
in  the  rural  districts  of  Kwangtung,  the  lepers  have  the 
privilege  of  accosting  funerals  for  alms,  and  if  they  are 
not  paid  they  jump  in  the  graves  until  they  receive  food. 
The  disease  is  now  ascertained  to  be  microbic  and  is  a 
heritage  from  times  in  China  which  were  even  dirtier 
than  the  present,  although  popularly  it  is  still  said  to  be  a 
poison  communicated  by  sun-dried  unsalted  fish. 

Along  the  sea-coast  of  southern  China,  in  all  the  large 
English  and  French  settlements,  hot  as  the  climate  is. 


334 


THE  CHINESE 


every  foreign  house  must  be  equipped  with  a drying 
room.  Here  are  stowed  master’s  violin  and  lady’s  fischu, 
and  in  fact  once  every  week  all  wearing  apparel  must  have 
its  day  in  the  hot  room.  Shoes  collect  so  much  fungus 
overnight  that  there  is  no  telling  what  mysterious  growth 
they  would  be  the  center  of,  were  time  allowed.  Here, 
therefore,  is  a people,  the  political  writers  moralize,  who 
must  keep  on  the  march  when  they  take  to  leather,  and 
that  it  will  be  woe  to  us  when  they  do.  The  home-made 
veneered  fufniture  of  the  colonizing  American  who  is 
on  his  way  to  Manila,  peels  like  an  orange,  and  a week 
afterward  his  glued  boxes  tumble  apart  to  the  touch  of 
unseen  hands.  When  discouraged,  go  to  the  Chinese 
cabinet-maker  and  watch  him  make  his  joints  with  mor- 
tise and  screw. 

There  are  no  papered  walls  in  the  rooms  of  the  palatial 
residences  of  foreign  exiles  in  Hong-Kong  or  on  Shameen 
Island,  Canton.  Walls  are  either  painted  or  kalsomined, 
and  the  streams  of  moisture  soon  make  them  sorry 
enough.  The  effect  would  be  unbearably  gloomy  were 
it  not  that  bright  native  tapestries  are  resorted  to,  to  hide 
the  oppressive  evidence  of  the  melancholy,  clammy 
climate. 

Following  the  American  boycott  of  1904  the  Chinese 
newspapers  trained  themselves  for  something  really  ad- 
mirable in  the  boycott  of  Indian  opium.  In  whatever 
manner  Chinese  life  is  relieved  of  the  blight,  every  lover 
of  humanity  will  welcome  the  abolition  of  the  abhorrent 
trade,  if  it  has  the  sincere  accompaniment  of  the  up- 
rooting of  the  far  too  extensive  Yunnan  and  Szechuen 
poppy  fields.  The  Chinese  poets  have  come  to  lament 
of  it  as  the  “ White  Dragon  of  the  treaty  ports  ” : “ Kzvo 
Wu  Ti  Ya  Picn”  “ Oh,  the  murderous  opium.”  The 


Eunuchs  of  the 


coPTRiOHr.  ev 

late  Empress  Dowager  in  the  garden  arcade, 
Palace.  Peking. 


Late  Empress  Dowager  Tse  Hsi,  carried  in  her  chair  l)v  eunuch 
l)earers  in  Peking’s  forbidden  Palace  Grounds. 


The 


lake  in  Royal  Palace  grounds.  Peking.  China.  1 ho  long 
rovotment  wall  is  built  of  inarhlo.  The  pagoda  is  of 
|)orcelain.  Patachn  hills  in  distance. 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES 


335 


drug  has  only  been  in  general  abuse  for  seventy  years, 
and  it  was  England  which  popularized  it  by  force  and 
persistent  proffer  of  it.  H.  E.  Chum,  once  viceroy  of 
Canton,  who  is  exceedingly  unpopular  with  the  Europeans 
of  Hong-Kong  because  of  his  tactless  patriotism,  is  espe- 
cially active  in  the  anti-opium  movement.  The  following 
is  quoted  from  one  of  his  circulars  to  officials,  published 
at  Canton  in  April,  1906:  “The  habit  is  perhaps  ex- 

cusable in  the  old  and  decrepit,  but  any  other  officials 
found  to  make  a habit  of  opium  smoking  will  be  imme- 
diately cashiered,  as  it  is  a danger  to  the  nation  and  de- 
moralizing to  the  individual.  The  opium  eater  is  one  of 
the  dead  who  is  not  yet  buried.”  A greater  than  Chum, 
the  veteran  Viceroy  Chang  Chih  Tung,  in  a passionate 
appeal,  calls  the  drug:  “a  worse  curse  than  flood  or 
beasts ; destroyer  of  mind ; consumer  of  substance ; trans- 
former into  demons  and  depraved ; the  only  salvation  is  a 
Renaissance  of  learning.”  The  use  of  morphia  is  in- 
creasing, and  for  this  England’s  ally,  Japan,  is  to  blame. 
She  is  flooding  China  with  cheap  hypodermic  syringes, 
but  American  influence  will  probably  encourage  China 
shortly  to  prohibit  the  importation  of  syringes  and  mor- 
phia. 

To  become  disgusted  with  the  mad  indulgence,  look  into 
the  dens  along  the  Leng  Thau  at  Amoy,  and  at  Toulon, 
Cherbourg  and  Brest ; into  the  wardrooms  of  the  French 
warships,  or  into  the  smoking-rooms  of  the  steamboats 
running  to  Canton  and  Macao  from  Hong-Kong,  like 
the  Tai-on,  the  Fatshan,  the  Heungshan,  etc.  Couches 
are  provided;  the  little  tin  can  is  feverously  opened  e’er 
the  steamer  casts  off.  The  native,  nervous  with  the  ying 
or  fiery  longing  upon  him,  searches  for  a prod  which  looks 
like  a hair-pin;  he  twirls  it  around  in  the  can  and  draws 


336 


THE  CHINESE 


out  a moist  bead  which  is  heated  and  rolled,  cooled  and 
rolled  and  heated  again.  At  last  its  consistency  suits. 
He  places  the  gummy  bead  on  the  large  flute-like  pipe,  or 
yen  siang  (smoking  pistol).  There  is  a ravenous,  full- 
mouthed  inhalation  as  the  peanut-oil  lamp  heats  the  ball 
into  vapor ; a mad  glare  in  which  brilliant  thoughts,  like  a 
Chinese  Coleridge’s  perhaps,  sweep  through  the  mind. 
He  does  not  really  see  you  at  the  window,  though  he  is 
looking  at  you  now.  You  are  only  one  of  a numerous 
fairy  company  which  is  hovering  there,  so  do  not  be  sensi- 
tive or  excuse  yourself.  Then  ensues  a sinking  dream, 
followed  by  a wild  awakening  and  craving  for  a further 
pipe,  which  he  prepares  with  sickening  impatience.  Our 
own  trans-Pacific  steamships  all  have  a hidden  opium 
room  for  Asiatic  patrons,  or  woe  betide  the  revenue  of 
that  ship.  When  a man  gets  tlie  habit  (and  about  one- 
fortieth  of  the  population  use  opium)  it  takes  about  three 
years  to  use  the  victim  up.  In  his  last  days,  see  how  the 
baggy  skin  hangs  on  his  bones.  How  black  he  is ! Such 
caverns  of  eyes  and  how  they  run  with  water!  Such 
chills  come  over  him  even  in  the  flame  of  the  zenith  sun ! 
Such  a thirst  he  has,  but  not  for  water!  He  knows  not 
for  what  he  longs;  he  only  remembers  that  when  he 
smokes  he  longs  no  more.  The  stupefied  effect  is  pro- 
duced by  the  alkaloids  being  inhaled  into  the  lungs.  The 
drug  costs  the  poor  Chinese  $122,000,000  a year, — more 
than  their  greatest  burden,  the  land  tax, — and  a sum 
which  if  spent  for  a navy  would  soon  make  them  omni- 
potent. It  makes  among  the  poor  nearly  all  their  crimi- 
nals, just  as  whisky  does  among  us.  If  the  religious  fear 
of  not  having  children  to  worship  at  their  graves  and  tal>- 
let  did  not  operate,  more  than  the  one  in  forty  would  fall 
to  the  vice.  The  priests  repeat  the  warning : “ Chih  yct\ 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES 


337 

pH  neng  yang  son  tai.”  “If  you  eat  opium  your  sons 
u ill  die  out  in  the  second  generation.” 

Formerly  the  opium  was  all  imported,  but  now  in  faith- 
less Yunnan,  which  diverts  all  her  rivers  into  French 
China,  and  in  the  most  fertile  upland  plain  of  China, 
Ching  Too  in  Szechuen,  in  the  irrigated  valleys  which  the 
engineers  Li  Ping,  father  and  son,  laid  out  in  250  B.  C., 
the  glorious  rice  terraces  are  being  obliterated  and  the 
cursed  poppy  is  blooming  everywhere.  All  except  the 
white  blooms  are  weeded  out,  the  white  variety  being 
most  prolific  in  opiate  juice.  So  the  most  populous  and 
happiest  province,  to  which  the  gods  gave  five  parallel 
rivers  to  drag  the  harvest  boats  down  to  the  Father  of 
Waters,  the  Yangtze,  becomes  the  first  to  be  inveigled  into 
the  folds  of  that  destructive  monster  whose  pestiferous 
haunts  have  heretofore  been  confined  to  the  seven  hundred 
thousand  acres  in  the  upper  Ganges  Valley.  The  scene  in 
Szechuen  is  interesting  enough ; the  land  is  plowed  deep 
by  a wooden  share,  which  is  hauled  by  anything  that  can 
pull:  water-buffalo,  woman,  pony  or  camel;  the  plots 
between  the  raised  mud  paths  are  flooded  from  well  or 
stream ; the  precious  seed  is  mixed  with  earth  before  it  is 
scattered,  a most  ingenious  method  to  prevent  thick  sow- 
ing and  wind  waste.  In  fourteen  weeks  the  heads  are 
cut  off  and  punctured  with  needles  six  times  successively, 
and  some  of  the  powdered  pods  are  mixed  with  the  juice 
in  preparing  the  thickened  article  which  is  shaped  and 
hardened  in  molds  about  the  size  of  a crab  apple.  These 
balls  are  again  sun  dried  and  shelf  cured. 

When  opium  is  banished  then  will  revive  indeed 
in  China  the  golden  age  of  Yau  and  Shun  of  which  Con- 
fucius sang.  On  June  15th,  1906,  the  British  govern- 
ment intimated  to  the  Wai  Wupu  that  they  would  agree 


338 


THE  CHINESE 


at  a sacrifice  to  Bengal  of  twenty-four  millions  a year, 
to  prohibit  the  exportation  of  India  morphia  to  China, 
provided  China  ceases  to  manufacture  her  own  opium 
otr  to  import  from  any  other  country  whatsoever.  This 
will  cost  China  a revenue  of  four  million  dollars  a year 
duties  on  the  three  thousand  tons  of  imported  India 
opium.  China  lays  no  special  tax  on  the  Yunnan  and 
Szechuen  poppy  fields,  but  she  taxes  the  thirty  thousand 
tons  of  crude  opium  produced  therefrom.  John  Morley’s 
speech  in  answer  to  the  prayers  of  the  years  rang  with 
the  revived  Christian  statesmanship  of  Wilberforce : “ I 
am  prepared  to  go  all  the  length  of  abolishing  the  opium 
trade  in  China  at  any  sacrifice  to  England  or  India.” 
The  government  of  the  Colony  of  Hong-Kong  is  sup- 
ported to  the  extent  of  one  third  by  the  tax  on  the 
“ Opium  Farm,”  which  is  owned  by  the  Chinese  and 
Parsees.  There  is  accordingly  a great  to-do  in  the  Col- 
ony over  the  alarming  prospect  of  increased  taxation  of 
property,  when  opiated  China  sobers  up.  Surprise  is  fre- 
quently expressed  by  travelers  at  the  scenes  enacted  at 
the  Canton  Steamboat  wharf  at  Hong-Kong  in  the  name 
of  British  law  and  dignity.  Chinese  gentlemen  are 
pounced  upon  by  the  minions  of  the  local  opium  farmer 
and  searched.  There  is  far  more  blackmail  than  excise 
in  the  scheme.  These  detectives  of  all  colors  and  records, 
the  “ beachcombers  ” of  an  occidental  civilization  tented 
on  remote  oriental  sands  for  a season,  abuse  their  au- 
thority flagrantly  when  they  conclude  that  every  China- 
man, poor  or  rich,  is  an  opium  smuggler  at  heart  and 
that  his  baggage  and  home  can  be  turned  upside  down 
at  any  hour  of  the  night  on  the  excuse  of  a suspected 
cache.  The  plan  of  rewarding  informers  has  led  to 
nothing  short  of  a widespread  system  of  fostering  the 


CLIMATE  AN’D  DISEASES 


3^39 


latent  secret  society  and  clan  spite.  The  farm  is  on  Ice- 
House  Lane  in  the  center  of  the  Colony,  and  visitors  will 
know  it  by  the  great  loads  of  mango  boxes,  gunny-cov- 
ered, drawn  to  its  gate  by  strings  of  nearly  naked  coolies. 

A humorous  instance  of  smuggling  recently  occurred 
at  Bangkok.  A coolie  wearing  an  enforced  look  of  faith- 
fulness to  his  master,  and  bearing  an  exceedingly  thick 
gold  sign  with  enormous  characters  of  “ Peace  and  Hon- 
esty,” exhibited  eagerness  to  go  ashore.  A gimlet  was 
procured  and  his  sign  explored.  It  revealed  in  its  re- 
cesses many  tins  of  the  muddy  opium  paste,  and  Mr. 
Coolie  and  his  queue  were  prompt  to  follow  their  chagrin 
over  the  taffrail. 

Large  sums  of  money  are  being  spent  at  Canton  by 
the  New  China  party  in  spreading  the  anti-Opium  cru- 
sade. Millions  of  pamphlets  and  caricatures  are  dis- 
tributed. American  and  Japanese  doctors  are  hired  in 
the  sanitariums  of  the  guilds.  Lectures  are  given  where 
distorted  and  stupefied  victims  are  exhibited  as  object 
lessons.  Anti-opium  Societies  are  being  formed  in  the 
villages.  The  members  wear  a badge  and  sign  a pledge. 

One  scene  will  illustrate  the  repentance  which  is  sweep- 
ing over  the  land.  I do  not  know  how  it  started,  but  an 
iconoclastic  penitence  was  the  inspiration  of  it.  Nor  do  I 
know  why  it  did  not  take  its  way  to  the  park  of  a sacred 
temple,  to  invoke  religious  auspices.  The  procession 
stopped  instead  at  Chang  Su  Ho’s  tea-gardens  outside 
of  Shanghai  for  the  Burning  of  the  Pipes  and  the  vow 
of  abstinence  from  opium.  Every  man  carried  the  evi- 
dence of  his  contrition  and  the  vessel  of  his  shame.  Nut- 
oil  lamps  of  best  hammered  Nanking  brass  work;  trays 
of  gorgeous  Ningpo  lacquering;  ivory  and  ebony  smok- 
ing pipes  of  best  Cantonese  carving;  jars  of  fuel  for  the 


I 


340 


THE  CHINESE 


lamps  from  Manchuria;  cups  of  the  opium  treacle  from 
Macao  and  Yunnan;  the  burned  crooked  toasting  pins 
with  their  precious  jewel  heads, — were  all  cast  on  an  oil- 
soaked  pyre,  the  base  of  which  was  made  from  the 
lounges  and  tables  contributed  by  a converted  opium  shop 
proprietor.  One  student  withdrew  his  ebony  pipe. 
There  was  a sigh  and  audible  prayers  begging  him  to 
“ be  a man.”  But  the  doubters  had  not  read  the  vehe- 
ment fire  in  his  eye.  He  drew  a saw  from  a nail,  cut 
the  costly  pipe  in  two,  as  though  it  were  cheap  white 
wood,  and  cast  the  demolished  cause  of  his  sorrow  on  the 
heap,  to  the  plaudits  of  the  crowd  who  from  even  the  roof 
of  the  compound-buildings  added  to  this  pile  of  forsaken 
idols,  gathered  together  in  an  old  nation’s  new  Hezekiah- 
like  strength.  Some  one  from  the  roof  threw  a great 
yellow  tile  trough  upon  the  mass,  and  broke  glass  and 
ivory  ware  with  a sickening  crackle,  but  it  did  not  draw 
forth  any  sighs,  or  anger,  or  laughter.  Men  only  looked 
the  sterner,  and  struck  hammers  into  the  head  of  the 
mass.  A mandarin  on  behalf  of  the  approving  officials, 
a tepao  for  the  people  themselves,  stepped  forth,  and 
all  drew  back.  A singing  girl  broke  through  the  uncon- 
sciously formed  circle,  and  asked  to  be  allowed  to  addi  S 
her  pipe  and  powder  puff.  Then  there  was  no  more  de- 
lay. Oil  was  called  for,  and  poured  from  kongs  until  .' 
the  stack  was  soaked,  when  the  flame  was  touched  to  < 

seal  a company  of  the  people  in  a vow  to  the  heavens  i 

that  they  would  chain  themselves  no  more  to  the  leprous  i 
past.  A recent  regulation  is  that  opium  pipes  shall  be  i 
licensed  at  one  dollar,  and  amusingly : “ the  license  shall  (i 
be  hung  on  the  pipe.” 

Japan  does  not  look  with  as  much  concern  as  does  •; 
China  on  the  opium  habit.  Last  March,  thirty  thousand  > 


1 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES 


341 


new  licenses  at  thirty  sen  each,  “ good  for  life  ” were  is- 
sued by  the  Japanese  to  the  conquered  Formosans. 

The  historic  destruction  in  ^lay,  1839,  of  $11,000,000 
worth  of  Indian  opium  by  the  Chinese  at  Canton  has  never 
had  a parallel  for  voluntary  and  really  philanthropic  sac- 
rifice of  property,  for  China  ultimately  paid  triple  the 
price  in  war  and  indemnity.  Two  hundred  chests  at  a 
time  were  emptied  into  a trench  which  was  filled  with  a 
mixture  of  lime  and  salt  water  until  the  twenty  thousand 
ruined  chests  were  drained  into  the  embrowned  creeks 
of  the  Chukiang  at  low  tide.  The  memories  of  the 
so-called  “perfidious  Commissioner”  Lin  Tseh  Su  and 
his  Emperor  Tau  Kwang,  whose  emotions  on  this  sub- 
ject at  least  were  on  the  most  exalted  plane,  both  merit 
monumental  praise.  The  two  memorable  letters  of  Lin’s 
to  Queen  Victoria,  pleading  with  her  to  put  an  end  to 
the  execrable  opium  trade,  just  before  the  war  broke 
out,  and  before  China  had  been  taught  to  grow  the  poppy, 
assume  almost  the  voice  of  an  angel  in  history,  plead- 
ing \\dth  tears  for  justice,  if  one  looks  at  it  from  the 
Chinese  side. 

The  Opium  Conference  of  the  nations  called  by  Amer- 
ica in  Shanghai  in  1909  was  a failure  owing  to  Hong- 
Kong’s  and  India’s  fear  of  loss  of  revenue,  but  Britain 
must  yet  fulfil  Mr.  Morley’s  promises.  We  shall  have 
other  conferences  and  America  will  call  them  until  Britain 
keeps  her  word.  The  effect  of  the  opium  abstinence  is 
going  to  add  potentially  to  China’s  already  vast  popular 
tion  by  the  decrease  in  the  death  rate. 

From  Formosa  to  Tonquin  the  Chinese  coast  is  fog- 
bound during  February  and  March.  The  warm  north- 
flowing Japan  current,  chafing  the  chilled  current  of  the 
Yellow  Sea  which  flows  south,  foments  a heavy  mist 


342 


THE  CHINESE 


curtain  which  makes  the  harbors,  especially  the  narrow 
Lyee-moon  entrance  to  Hong-Kong,  impenetrable  for 
days.  The  coast-line  with  its  many  peaks  of  three  thou- 
sand feet  altitude,  is  blanketed.  There  is  nothing  to  do 
but  anchor  when  iron-bound  islands  stud  the  channels. 
Often  the  peaks  alone  are  clear  and  those  who  dwell  upon 
them  for  coolness  behold  glorious  effects  of  a sun-lit  fog 
rolling  off  and  again  folding  up  the  spires  and  towers 
of  a great  city  from  whence  still  come  the  distant  cries 
of  life.  Suddenly  a gale  rushes  down  the  gullies,  and 
licks  up  the  curtain.  In  an  instant  is  revealed  an  active 
metropolis,  colored  with  the  dyes  and  quaint  with  the 
forms  of  the  Orient.  Or  again  the  peaks  only  are  hid, 
and  the  bearers,  as  they  climb  the  hills,  gradually  take 
you  in  your  mountain  chair  deeper  and  deeper  into  a chill- 
ing heaven  of  milk-white  fog,  in  which  the  coolies  stumble 
and  with  difficulty  pick  out  the  cement  path  that  leads 
to  chea  vous,  or  better  chez  moi. 

None  is  quicker  to  concede  the  dangers  of  his  own 
summer  climate  than  the  Oriental  himself,  inured  though 
he  is  to  it  by  heredity  and  habitude.  David  said : “ I will 
lift  up  mine  eyes  unto  the  hills,  whence  cometh  my 
help  ” ; the  Arab  goatherd  to-day  drives  his  flock  from 
the  plain  of  Er  Rahah  to  the  cooler  clefts  on  Sinai’s  Peak. 
The  Pekingese  officials  flee  to  the  heights  of  Patachu; 
the  Seoul  man  betakes  himself  to  the  Namhan  Hills.  The 
Tokio  resident  retires  to  Chusenji’s  mountain  lake  and 
splendid  heights.  The  Ningpo  people  climb  Foting  Hill 
on  Phutho  Island.  The  PIong-Kongite  takes  a tram 
which  lifts  him  in  seven  minutes  fifteen  hundred  feet 
above  his  boiling  harbor  and  he  is  borne  in  chairs  three 
hundred  feet  higher  to  find  a cooling  breath  brought  by 
the  monsoon  over  the  peaks.  Or  on  a still  night  he  slips 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES 


343 


down  the  tram;  takes  a launch  and  tears  around  the 
mountain-encircled  bay  to  create  a breeze  by  motion,  but 
the  bow  cuts  only  into  molten  waves  of  hot,  though  mag- 
nificent phosphoresence. , 

It  is  July;  the  official  heat  in  the  shade  is  92,  the  hu- 
midity 90.  There  has  been  no  rain  in  six  months.  How 
they  suflfer  in  number  five  district  of  Hong-Kong,  where 
is  packed  the  densest  population  of  the  world,  one  thou- 
sand to  the  acre,  against  the  nine  hundred  of  New  York’s 
East  Side,  and  seven  hundred  of  London’s  Whitechapel! 
The  pigs  crawl  to  the  gutter  and  become  molten  grease 
from  their  own  and  the  sun’s  heat.  The  water  of  the  bay 
shines  as  metallic  as  a pan,  and  radiates  the  heat  like 
molten  steel.  The  once  gray  and  green  war-ships  have 
been  painted  white  again  to  de-focus  the  blazing  rays. 
To  go  to  the  waters  for  relief  in  daytime  never  occurs  to 
the  minds  of  those  experienced  in  the  Orient.  There  is  a 
mica-like  glitter  in  the  blinding  atmosphere;  it  is  the  sun 
flashing  from  the  suspended  sand  and  dust  particles. 
Dogs  are  going  mad,  for  the  springs  have  all  dried  up, 
and  there  is  barely  enough  drinking  water  for  humans. 
The  soldiers  in  the  barracks  of  this  garrison  post  which  is 
the  strongest  in  the  far  East  lie  all  day  on  their  backs  and 
cry  to  the  punkah  coolies  to  fan  away  their  curses.  The 
sailors,  baking  between  the  steel  walls  of  the  war-ships, 
are  ordered  to  dive  overboard  on  the  shady  side  of  the 
ship  after  four  o’clock.  Ale  is  struck  from  the  rations 
because  heat  and  alcohol  are  driving  men  as  mad  as  a 
sailor  becalmed  in  the  Red  Sea.  The  foreign  sick,  toss- 
ing upon  the  hot  canvas  of  their  cots,  bemoan  how  fright- 
fully far  away  home  is.  There  is  not  a breath  stirring 
the  Australian  eucalyptus  trees  which  have  been  planted 
to  drive  away  the  malaria  breeding  Anopheles  mosquitoes. 


344 


THE  CHINESE 


They  may  talk  of  a thermometer  on  a flat  roof  in  Bag- 
dad registering  150  in  the  sun,  but  please  remember  that 
the  Tigris  Valley  has  nothing  like  the  humidity  which  ac- 
companies heat  at  Hong-Kong,  and  it  is  humidity  only 
which  kills,  and  which  tells  you  of  its  heartless  intent 
while  it  is  doing  the  killing.  The  barometer  is  scanned 
at  the  newpaper  offices  to  see  if  there  is  any  chance  of  a 
typhoon  breaking  the  awful  still  glow.  It  is  painful  to 
hear  a ’rickisha  move  along  at  mid-day ; what  fool  can  be 
daring  a sunstroke ! Every  one  keeps  changes  of  clothes 
at  the  office,  for  the  journey  to  business  in  a jolting  sedan 
chair  has  brought  out  the  perspiration  which  has  wet 
one’s  Chifu  silk  coat  through  and  through.  Relays  are 
hired  for  your  punkah-coolie  force,  who  are  on  night 
work.  You  keep  your  shoes  near  your  bed  to  throw  at 
a delinquent,  who,  as  soon  as  he  thinks  you  are  asleep, 
stops  pulling  the  rope  of  the  ceiling-fan,  and  falls  asleep 
himself,  utterly  indifferent  to  the  fact  that  the  lack  of  a 
breeze  will  at  once  wake  you  up.  It  is  stifling  under  your 
mosquito  curtain  and  you  tear  it  down,  trusting  to  the 
punkah  breeze  to  alarm  the  flying  cockroaches  and  other 
winged  pests.  You  raise  the  temperature  of  your  bath, 
for  your  diminishing  vitality  will  not  stand  the  slightly 
cooled  water  from  the  cistern  of  your  home,  or  the  arte- 
sian water  of  the  club.  Day  by  day  the  pavements  and 
walls  grow  more  dazzling  in  the  sun ; night  by  night  your 
head  swims  and  you  think  you  will  swoon  away  for  ever. 
If  only  you  could,  and  the  torture  of  recoveries  not  be  re- 
peated. You  grow  terrorized,  and  the  sight  of  the  blue 
walls  of  a Christian’s  cemetery  in  exile  gives  you  a 
panic.  You  are  fearing  that  after  all  you  will  not  be 
able  to  pull  through.  They  are  sending  the  patients  who 
have  been  operated  upon,  from  the  hospitals  on  the  peak 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES 


345 


by  ships  to  Wei-Hai-Wei  and  Chifu,  as  their  wounds 
will  not  heal  here  in  the  south.  The  barometer  lowers  and 
you  have  high  hopes,  but  still  no  rain  comes.  Two  days 
later,  a ship  arrives,  minus  a yard  and  a boat  or  two ; ex- 
asperating! the  blow  swung  just  clear  of  the  Colony. 

You  hate  the  full  moon,  it  only  seems  like  another 
glaring  sun  in  the  stifling,  sleepless  night.  Some  of  the 
trees  impatient  with  nature  herself  are  shedding  their 
leaves  in  a land  where  there  never  is  frost.  The  king 
of  blooms,  the  purple  lotus  in  the  public  gardens,  has 
closed  and  gone  to  golden  seed.  It  marks  the  height 
of  the  tropic  season.  The  reservoirs  have  lost  their 
purple  sheen  and  are  down  to  the  yellow  liquid  of  the 
muddy  bottom,  and  weeds  are  beginning  to  grow  down 
the  sides  of  the  basins  as  a sign  of  the  subjugation  of 
hygiene.  The  stores  have  run  sho^rt,  and  you  send  your 
foki  out  in  a sampan  to  the  steamers  in  the  harbor  for 
“ Schweppe  and  Scotch.”  Religion  comes  to  the  gates 
of  nature.  The  missionaries  are  praying  in  the  chapels; 
the  bonzes  are  beating  cymbals  and  dog-skin  kettledrums 
as  soon  as  the  day  begins;  the  sampan  women  are  light- 
ing extra  handfuls  of  punk  sticks,  and  even  you,  an  ir- 
religious seven  year  man,  on  your  second  term,  are  think- 
ing of  your  mother,  and  joining  the  rest  in  prayer  to 
her  God  for  rain.  Again  the  barometer  is  sought;  it  is 
falling.  Men  gather  round  it  at  the  club  and  the  harbor 
office.  The  bulletin  of  rain  is  announced  in  the  Chinese 
sheet  and  credit  is  given  to  the  dragon  for  old  Faith’s 
sake,  though  the  proof-reader  smiles  now.  But  where 
is  that  first  wind  that  is  to  come  from  a corner  some- 
where, anywhere,  and  open  the  gates  of  Salvation? 

The  wind  at  last  rises  with  the  voice  of  an  angel,  and 
the  harbor  in  welcoming  joy  has  leaped  up  with  white 


346 


THE  CHINESE 


arms.  It  is  growing  darker  even  at  four  o’clock,  and 
the  burned  hills  are  not  so  glaringly  red  and  white. 
There  are  shadows  spotting  them.  Coolies  come  out  of 
their  cellar  retreats  and  are  gathering  at  the  curbs,  a high- 
ya  upon  their  voices  and  a new  soul  in  their  eyes.  The 
fowl  on  the  disease  heaps  are  crowing,  and  the  caged 
Tientsin  larks  are  singing.  How  the  world  to-day  wor- 
ships Heaven  in  whatever  language  you  pronounce  the 
word,  and  shows  its  faith  before  the  gift ! Some  one  de- 
clares they  have  seen  a drop  on  the  pavement,  and  a num- 
ber have  dropped  their  bamboo  poles  and  are  stooping 
over  to  make  examination.  Hoi  Loi  is  shouted:  Mali 
tells  Kih  that  he  did  it  with  his  wet  finger  and  the  homely 
humor  explodes  the  always  cheerful  native  crowd.  Of  a 
sudden  a darkness,  like  later  evening,  closes  in.  The 
drops  strike  like  shots  on  the  wide  grass  Hupeh  hats  of 
the  coolies  and  on  the  starched  blue  Nankeen  blinds  of 
the  sedan  chairs.  It  pelts;  it  comes  in  spears  and  sheets; 
the  earth  drinks  and  rises  in  a glorious  perfume.  Goats, 
fowl,  pigs,  dogs  and  water-buffaloes  break  bounds  and 
join  master  and  servant  in  the  street.  There  is  no  bond 
or  free,  driven  or  driver,  Yellow  or  White,  animal  or  its 
superior,  for  a spell.  All  stand  forth  equal  in  need  and 
gratitude.  The  curse  is  ended  and  there  is  respite  from 
the  sentence  of  death  by  the  shafts  of  the  sun.  How  it 
rains ! The  gulleys  and  gorges  roar  in  the  night.  Thirty 
inches  fall  in  twenty-four  hours.  The  great  white  Praya  ; 
has  been  converted  into  a lake,  which,  as  it  drains  into  the  ^ 
sea,  makes  of  the  long  revetment  walls  a waterfall  of  1 

wonderful  width.  The  mounted  army  officers  dash  t 

through  the  flood  and  remind  one  another : “ How  like  it  f 
is  to  Calcutta’s  maidan  in  August.”  The  unpaved  coun- 
try roads  become  a viscid  pudding  and  your  house  coolies  » 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES  347 

at  last  have  a good  excuse  for  delaying  the  supplies  for 
your  dinner. 

It  is  one  of  the  world’s  wonders  to  go  out  into  a tropic 
storm  and  hear  nature  take  up  her  clarion  in  the  weed- 
grown  gulleys,  and  see  her  hands  drive  the  white  tor- 
rents over  the  precipices.  It  is  not  the  effect  of  Niagara, 
which  has  always  been  the  same;  it  is  the  alarm  of  the 
unfamiliar,  for  here  you  stood  yesterday  and  now  you 
know  it  not  in  its  mad,  new  grandeur.  Your  precious 
bamboo  Venetian  blind,  that  shaded  you  for  so  many 
months  with  all  the  faithfulness  of  the  prophet’s  gourd, 
has  gone  like  a thing  possessed  of  the  hilarious  storm 
soul,  fluttering  your  poster-pictures  from  its  yellow  sail. 
What  of  it;  it  is  a sign  of  manumission.  The  last  week 
of  April,  1908,  was  unprecedented  for  rainfall  in  southern 
China.  Fifty  inches  fell,  making  seventy  inches  for  the 
year,  which  is  twice  what  Shanghai  and  ten  times  what 
Peking  gets.  Canton  and  its  villages  were  under  two 
feet  of  water.  The  creeks  flowing  into  the  Sikiang 
(West  River)  rose  with  their  parent  and  submerged  rice 
fields,  trees  and  huts.  Millions  die  yearly  of  famine  be- 
cause China  persists  in  a devotion  to  rice.  The  riverine 
fields  necessarily  are  in  danger  of  continual  inunda- 
tion by  the  flooding  of  her  great  rivers  whose  head- 
waters are  not  gradually  released  by  restraining  for- 
ests. If  China  would  only  take  to  raising  grain  on 
higher  land ! 

In  August  last,  Peking,  which  in  winter  has  as  low  a 
thermometer  as  Albany,  reported  105  degrees  of  heat, 
and  a cholera  scourge,  with  three  hundred  deaths  daily, 
added  to  the  horrors  of  a summer  residence  in  the  capi- 
tal. It  is  impossible  under  present  hygienic  ignorance, 
to  restrain  the  natives  from  eating  green  fruit  even 


348 


THE  CHINESE 


during  cholera  epidemics.  When  the  deadly  cramps 
strike  them  the  native  expresses  himself  by  saying:  “ A 

rat  is  eating  me.”  I 

Hong-Kong  is  the  emporium  for  Manila  in  cattle  and  | 
fresh  produce,  and  the  United  States  Marine  Hospital 
inspectors  are  stationed  at  the  former  place  with  all  , 
power  to  vise  exportations.  I recall  an  official  excursion  j 
with  one  of  the  doctors  during  the  prevalence  of  a chol- 
era epidemic  in  Manila,  to  find  the  impossible:  a potato 
field  in  the  Canton  delta  which  was  innocent  of  the  abom- 
inable method  of  using  human  fertilizer.  To  prevent  the 
carriage  of  cholera  germs  these  officials  will  not  vise  dur- 
ing certain  seasons  the  exportation  to  America  of  the 
sacred  narcissus  roots,  which  are  wrapped  in  Chinese 
earth.  We  rest  secure  at  home  because  our  government 
sleeps  not  abroad. 

A foreigner  wonders  why  his  underclothing,  which  is 
beaten  on  stones  in  streams,  should  afflict  him  with  spots 
which  burn  agonizingly.  He  soon  discovers  that  the 
clothes  were  dried  on  grass  patches  which  have  been 
used  for  years  for  the  same  purpose,  and  that  he 
is  poisoned  with  dobie  itch.  Small  white  pimples  form 
under  the  skin  wherever  there  is  chafing,  and  the  tor- 
tured griffin  is  transformed  into  a humorous  jumping- 
jack  for  the  amusement  of  the  veterans  of  great  and  little 
ills. 

In  the  early  days  of  oriental  colonies  the  now  familiar  f- 
dengue  fever  (then  called  the  Sand)  was  looked  upon 
as  a rapidly  approaching  stroke  of  death,  as  immediate 
insensibility  attacked  the  limbs,  and  early  writings  are 
full  of  the  amusing  fears  of  travelers.  The  symptoms  * 

are  similar  to  the  plague,  excepting  that  there  are  no  < 

eruptions  under  the  arms.  There  is  immediate  lassitude, 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES 


349 


bone-grinding  aches,  and  a delirium  of  pleasant  visions 
such  as  opiates  produce.  The  most  marked  feature  is 
the  itch,  which  attacks  the  whole  body  at  once  during 
convalescence.  The  sufferer  is  soused  in  hot  baths; 
salves  are  applied,  but  do  what  his  nurses  may,  the  victim 
must  stand  three  days  of  the  most  violent  itching  that 
imagination  can  comprehend. 

The  climate  has  produced  a certain  moral  effect  upon 
the  Chinese  of  the  south.  In  Europe,  heat  has  made  the 
southern  races  hot-tempered  and  tender  under  trial.  In 
China  the  heat  and  humidity  have  taught  the  race  that  if 
they  are  to  live  at  all,  they  must  take  things  calmly,  and 
thus  in  conquering  their  bodies  so  as  to  endure  the  cli- 
mate, they  have  unconsciously  disciplined  their  minds, 
as  perhaps  no  other  race  has,  for  greatness  in  a world  mis- 
sion of  the  future.  Their  coolness  of  temperament  is 
reinforced  by  the  philosophies  of  the  schools.  The  race 
further  steadies  itself  under  discipline,  as  witness  the 
native  regiment  raised  by  the  British  at  Wei-Hai-Wei,  and 
Yuan  Shi  K’ai’s  troops, — and  with  this  threefold  pa- 
tience, promises  to  become  a ponderous  machine  when 
drilled  to  methods,  whether  of  modern  commerce  or  war- 
fare. Their  equipoise  of  temperament  is  possibly  best  il- 
lustrated by  an  absolute  absence  of  taste  for  alcoholic 
stimulant. 

It  is  peculiar  that  a tubercular  diathesis,  absent  in 
China,  should  be  the  strongest  inclination  of  the  race 
when  they  emigrate. 

An  oriental  scourge,  not  so  widely  written  of  in  these 
days  because  it  is  attacking  foreigners  less  than  it  used 
to  when  ships  made  slower  voyages,  is  beri-beri,  the 
germs  of  Avhich  are  taken  from  moldy  rice,  like  the 
Rangoon  product,  which  carries  the  excrementitious  in- 


350 


THE  CHINESE 


fective  matter  of  a small  brown  weevil.  The  damp  cli- 
mate of  the  south  fosters  sporadic  outbreaks  at  Canton.  i 
Those  who  live  on  the  ground  floor  are  particularly  sub- 
ject to  it.  The  Portuguese  of  Macao  therefore  make  of 
their  street  floor  merely  a shed  for  the  ’rickisha  and  rake. 

The  beautiful  stairway  leads  from  the  middle  of  the 
adobe  tiling  to  the  second  floor,  where  the  family  lives, 
the  choicest  situation  in  the  home  thus  being  given  up 
to  the  necessities  of  hygiene.  The  disease  only  becomes 
epidemic  where  vegetables  are  lacking  in  the  food  and 
where  the  people  are  crowded  together  without  exercise, 
as  on  shipboard  or  in  camps.  As  in  plague,  light  keeps  i 
down  the  beri-beri  germs.  Instead  of  a swelling  of  the  . 
gland,  it  exhibits  itself  by  a swelling  of  the  ankle.  The 
mortality  is  over  ninety  per  cent.  The  Osaka  hospitals 
had  many  cases  break  out  among  the  rice-fed  troops  who 
were  invalided  home  from  the  great  war  in  1905. 

Distant  from  the  town  of  Victoria  four  miles  through  , 
the  hills,  or  ten  miles  around  the  island  of  Hong-Kong, 
is  the  deserted  settlement  of  Stanley  which  first  created 
the  name : “ The  White  Man’s  Grave.”  The  only  thing 
there  now  which  shows  the  attention  of  man  is  the  gov- 
ernment fence  around  the  graves  of  the  soldiers  who  fell 
a prey  to  the  malaria  in  the  forties,  when  drainage  and 
tropical  digging  were  not  understood  as  they  are  at  pres- 
ent. The  mortality  was  eighty  per  cent.  Even  now  the 
admissions  to  hospital  on  account  of  malaria  are  one-third 
of  the  troops  on  the  sick  list.  The  worst  feature  of  the 
fever  is  its  predisposition  to  other  diseases.  Governments  1 
may  well  fear  malaria  as  it  costs  seven  hundred  dollars  to  f 

invalid  a soldier  home.  It  is  cheaper  to  keep  him  well  on  f 

foreign  station,  which  explains  the  recent  growth  of  recre-  * 
ation  grounds  and  clubs  without  canteens,  and  the  increase  > 


.1 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES 


351 


also  in  the  amount  and  variety  of  his  work  before  and 
after  sundown.  Mimic  war  makes  for  stern  health  and 
leaves  less  time  for  whisky  and  worry. 

A Chinese  emigrant  will  lift  his  hat  before  his  mouth 
to  protect  his  inhalation  if  you  mention  the  lethal  valleys 
of  the  Red  River  in  Tonquin  or  the  mephitic  Salween 
in  western  Yunnan,  which  the  superstitious  will  cross 
only  in  the  night.  This  of  course  is  the  worst  thing  they 
could  do,  as  the  sun  exercises  some  effect  in  checking 
the  malarious  vapors. 

Cockroaches  are  a noisy  pest  which  rummage  the 
whole  night.  They  eat  the  enamel  off  your  shoes.  Every 
blue  covered  book  on  the  shelves  is  attacked.  You  can 
not  keep  them  out,  for  they  come  in  on  the  wings  of 
the  darkness  and  escape  with  the  wings  of  the  morning. 
They  dash  in  your  face  as  you  turn  up  the  lights,  and 
they  dive  into  your  friend’s  cocktail  glass  between  the 
time  of  salute  and  swallow.  When  you  pursue  them 
they  back  up  under  your  chiffonier  and  eye  you  with 
a squint.  In  other  words  this  pest  of  China  is  a winged, 
a wiser,  a more  traveled  and  a larger  bird  than  our  crawl- 
ing specimen  in  occidental  cellars. 

It  is  considered  brotherly  among  the  natives  to  use  the 
same  basin  of  water  when  handing  to  the  guests  after  a 
meal  a hot  wet  cloth  to  wipe  the  face.  This  unfortunate 
etiquette  is  sowing  much  of  the  trachoma  which  afflicts 
the  race.  However  the  Chinese  do  not  use  one  water 
for  a family  bath  as  do  the  Japanese,  and  suffer  from 
less  trachoma  and  skin  diseases.  Faces,  pitted  by  small- 
pox, which  they  call  “ Heavenly  Flowers,”  are  constantly 
met.  In  Hong-Kong  the  natives  offer  no  resistance  to 
vaccination. 

A great  deal  has  been  written  that  the  race  does  not 


352 


THE  CHINESE 


pursue  heavy  physical  exercises  and  participates  only  in 
light  outdoor  games.  But  it  is  not  to  be  judged  there- 
from that  the  Chinese  ignore  the  importance  of  physical 
culture;  they  differ  from  us  in  that  their  care  of  the  body 
is  by  a lighter  rule  suited  to  their  climate,  and  their  more 
exhausting  day’s  work.  The  leading  classic  of  the  na- 
tion, the  fount  of  all  its  morals.  On  Filial  Piety,  lays 
down  the  following  as  the  basic  principle  of  conduct: 
“ The  first  thing  which  filial  duty  requires  of  us  is  that 
we  carefully  preserve  from  all  injury  and  in  a perfect 
state,  the  bodies  which  we  have  received  from  our  par- 
ents.” 

Who  that  has  taken  his  first  ride  behind  the  hill- 
climbing chair  coolies  of  Hong-Kong  has  not  marveled 
at  these  splendid  specimens  of  muscular  strength  ? They 
are  with  one  exception  a sculptor’s  Greek-like  model  in 
the  thin  ankles  and  knees;  great  calves  and  thighs  and 
fair  chest  and  neck  muscles.  The  arms  however  are 
rather  thin.  A rhythm  to  the  quick  step  is  beaten  with 
one  arm  extended,  or  the  “ goose-arm  ” as  the  German 
sailors  call  it. 

A race  which  believes  in  the  infusion  of  a young  buck’s 
horns,  ginseng  and  cockroaches’  wings  for  a fever  anti- 
dote may  be  expected  to  follow  other  unusual  medical 
methods.  With  no  modern  knowledge  of  dissection  or 
the  osseous  system,  a Chinese  doctor  jabs  needles  six 
inches  long  all  over  the  body  and  will  never  hit  a bone  or 
an  artery.  It  is  said  they  practise  upon  wax  figures.  In 
a wonderfully  responsive  way  they  compel  the  patient  to 
rouse  his  courage  and  exhilarate  his  nerves.  They  are 
decided  dietists  and  bring  about  therefore  many  results 
similar  to  our  own.  Broths  are  made  of  bay,  honey,  car- 
bon, blood,  wine  and  almonds;  aperients  and  hot  water 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES 


353 


flushing  are  called  into  service.  They  attach  great  im- 
portance to  the  appearance  of  the  tongue.  Violent  ice 
douches,  exhausting  exercise  and  sudden  smotherings  are 
resorted  to.  The  severest  kind  of  pinching  osteopathy  is 
used  efficaciously  for  dyspepsia  and  some  cases  of  mas- 
sage are  so  heroic  that  the  athletic  physician  kneads  his 
groaning  victim  with  his  knees  as  well  as  hands.  They 
do  not  study  the  nervous  system,  or  harden  the  outer  edge 
of  the  hand,  as  do  the  Japanese,  who  in  ju-jitsu  make  one 
blow  on  a nerve  center  paralyze  a man. 

Their  diagnosticians  believe  in  microbes,  but  consider 
that  they  are  larger  than  microscopic,  and  so  treat  for 
eggs  and  worms.  In  stomach  troubles,  neuralgia,  rheu- 
matism and  boils,  they  are  quick  to  effect  a cure.  An 
infusion  of  crickets’  wings  is  used  to  reduce  obesity. 
They  attach  the  greatest  importance  in  their  diagnosis 
to  the  beats  of  the  arteries  and  claim  that  there  are 
twelve  movements  of  significance.  There  are  no  apothe- 
caries, the  physician  himself  compounding  his  prescrip- 
tions, and  the  patient,  if  able,  is  encouraged  to  come  to 
the  doctor’s  residence  to  take  his  medicine.  Their  of- 
fices are  fitted  up  artistically,  the  physician  claiming  that 
the  new  and  agreeable  surroundings  have  a beneficial  in- 
fluence. A pair  of  deer’s  horns  (not  a mortar  and  pestle) 
mark  the  doors,  and  crockery  jars  take  the  place  of  our 
bottles.  Butcher  shops  often  add  one  shelf  of  medicines 
to  the  stock.  No  physician  uses  his  own  ’rickisha;  he 
hires  one,  and  it  is  customary  for  the  patient’s  family  to 
pay  the  coolies  on  departure.  When  the  fee  is  finally  re- 
ceived, it  is  wrapped  in  tissue  paper  and  is  called 
“ golden  thanks.”  Withal,  zeal  is  added  unto  prayer 
and  prescription,  for  no  physician  is  paid  in  full  if  his 
patient  succumbs. 


354 


THE  CHINESE 


Ginseng  (ivywort)  is  dried  over  charcoal  in  Korea. 

It  is  cultivated  under  screens  in  a valley  sixty  miles  from 
Seoul.  Korea  makes  six  hundred  thousand  dollars  a year 
from  its  sale,  and  America  might  increase  her  trade  to 
millions  in  the  really  useless  root  to  which  the  Chinese  pin 
their  greatest  hopes  in  sickness.  The  imports  of  the  root 
at  Hong- Kong  in  1908  had  dropped  to  seven  hundred 
and  sixty-six  piculs,  as  compared  with  eleven  hundred  and 
ten  piculs  in  1900.  A sweet-tasting,  dark-colored,  clean 
and  unbroken  wild  root  is  preferred.  Korean  roots  bring 
the  largest  price,  sometimes  as  high  as  twenty-five  hun- 
dred dollars  Mexican  a picul.  WTile  an  infusion  of  the 
root  is  general,  some  of  it  is  preserved  in  honey.  The 
black-barred,  adobe-tiled  cellars  on  Des  Voeux  Road 
West,  Hong-Kong,  where  the  herb  is  dealt  in,  are  unpre- 
tentious enough  places,  but  the  canny  dealers  there  know 
the  pulse  of  trade  and  in  a moment  can  judge  the  valuable 
roots,  picking  out  faults  of  weevil,  moisture,  imperfect 
roots,  the  paler  cultivated  plants,  or  roots  which  have 
been  redried.  Long  as  the  voyage  across  the  Pacific  is, 
the  importers  in  Hong-Kong  will  receive  the  goods  only 
on  consignment. 

Another  skin  disease,  communicated  by  the  unspotted  ^ 
Culex  mosquito,  is  our  familiar  “ Barbadoes’  leg,”  where 
the  bitten  part  swells  up  hard,  sore  and  feverous,  and  j 
makes  the  terrified  sufferer  think  his  last  day  has  come,  J 

for  he  is  sure  he  has  been  bitten  in  his  sleep  by  a hea-  | 

thenish  salamander.  5 

Flights  of  greenish  gray  locusts  are  an  occasional  visi- 
tation. They  settle  on  the  shrubs  with  weight  enough  to 
break  their  branches.  In  three  or  four  hours  they  will 
leave  a dozen  acres  as  bare  of  green  as  though  a forest 
fire  had  singed  the  landscape,  and  then  like  all  plagues 


The  old  examination  park  of  12,000  brick  stalls  at  Canton,  Sontli 
China.  No  lectures  were  given;  the  University 
consisted  of  an  Examining  Board. 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES  355 

which  have  accomplished  their  malign  purpose,  they  are 
off  with  the  wings  of  the  morning. 

But  the  never-to-be-forgotten  thing,  when  on  the  sub- 
ject of  the  Chinese  climate,  is  her  typhoons  (Fuhg  Kau) 
of  August  and  September.  Ninety  miles  an  hour  veloc- 
ity has  been  recorded.  I stayed  a day  and  a night  at 
Hong-Kong  fifteen  hundred  feet  above  the  water,  during 
one  of  these  blows.  The  crescendo  shrieks  of  the  wind 
were  terrifying.  A crash  was  heard : it  was  the  brick  end 
of  the  Mount  Austin  barracks,  four  hundred  feet  above  us 
in  the  clouds,  being  blown  in.  A walk  afterward 
through  the  town  on  the  lower  terraces  revealed  a desola- 
tion of  windows  and  shutters,  eucalyptus  and  banyan 
trees,  like  Detaille’s  painting  of  The  Defense  of  Cham- 
pigny.  A barricade  wooden  shutter,  with  a thick  ty- 
phoon brace,  is  fitted  on  these  tropical  houses,  for  no 
glass  would  stand  for  a moment.  On  another  occasion  I 
had  been  out  on  the  auxiliary  Japanese  cruiser  Nippon 
Maru  for  a trial  trip,  which  was  completed  in  haste  at 
- Aberdeen  under  a rapidly  lowering  barometer.  With 
full  speed,  in  a lightened  ship,  riding  frightfully  high, 
we  returned  to  the  northern  anchorage  under  the  shelter 
of  High  West  Peak  at  Hong-Kong.  The  blow  had 
come;  it  was  too  dangerous  for  two  days  to  take  a tug 
boat  ashore,  even  if  one  were  available.  Great  war-ships 
steamed  against  their  chains  and  plowed  like  Leviathan. 
White-crested  billows  vied  with  the  gale  in  a mad  race 
westward.  Behind  the  breakwater  at  Causeway  Bay, 
and  at  Shau-Ki-Wan  and  Shelter  Bays,  a forest  of  junks 
were  hid  under  the  Wong  Nei  Chong  Hills.  Now  and 
then,  several  would  be  torn  out  into  the  path  of  the 
storm,  like  so  much  seaweed. 

Just  previous  to  a typhoon,  it  is  a wonderful  spectacle 


356 


THE  CHINESE 


to  see  the  excited  crews  and  women  of  the  junks, — a 
dozen  on  each  two-piece  fir  sweep,  sculling  to  help  the 
steam  launches  as  they  pull  strings  of  boats  to  safety  be- 
hind some  peak.  As  the  storms  are  circular,  a refuge  that 
is  safe  one  night  may  be  the  exposed  position  next  morn- 
ing, and  therefore  there  is  much  loss  of  life  among  the 
harassed  junk  people.  A typhoon  covers  a space  of  one 
hundred  miles  in  diameter.  There  is  a calm  of  ten  miles 
in  the  center,  and  when  passengers  on  a Pacific  liner  are 
congratulating  themselves  that  they  have  passed  almost 
through  death,  they  can  not  understand  the  worried  look 
of  the  navigating  officers,  who  know  that  shortly  they 
must  run  through  the  other  rim  of  the  storm.  When 
things  seem  the  worst  because  of  the  perfect  deluge  of 
rain  and  darkness,  it  is  an  unfailing  indication  of  a rising 
barometer  and  the  end  of  trouble.  Fortunately  the  ty- 
phoons give  about  three  hours  local  warning,  as  they 
sweep  along  the  coast  northward  from  the  tropics,  in  a 
barometer  dropping  as  low  as  twenty-eight  and  one-half, 
a “ typhoon-bank,”  or  over  bright  west  at  sunset,  with  a 
cloudy  eastern  horizon  accompanying,  and  huge  unbroken 
billows  which  cast  their  white  wreaths  on  the  shores  of  a 
foamless  sea.  We  were  warned  in  the  harbor  by  black 
baskets  (globe,  oblong,  or  cone  shaped  to  indicate  direc- 
tion) being  hoisted  to  the  peak  on  the  commodore’s  East 
Indian  war  relic,  the  hulk  Tamar.  The  flag-ship 
hoisted  a red  burgee  over  a white  ensign  as  a signal  to 
steam  against  anchor  chains  at  three  quarter  speed. 
Manila  and  Hong-Kong  are  more  in  touch  regarding 
typhoons  than  trade,  and  the  former  city  sends  almost 
daily  warnings  by  cable.  I recall  the  United  States  bat- 
tleship Oregon,  after  a fiercer  struggle  than  she  experi- 
enced in  the  battle  of  Santiago,  limping  through  a ty- 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES 


357 


phoon  into  Yokohama  liarbor  in  the  fall  of  1903,  with 
Iier  steel  deck  plates  sprung,  and  boats  gone  by  the  board. 

The  historic  typhoons  of  China  are  those  of  July  21st, 
1841;  July,  1862;  September  22nd,  1874,  and  September 
20th,  1906;  and  of  India  that  which  swept  over  Calcutta 
in  October,  1864,  which  last  drowned  forty  thousand  peo- 
ple. In  the  1874  typhoon  the  saddest  destruction  was 
wreaked  along  the  noble  Praya  Grande  at  beautiful  Ma- 
cao. That  the  unique  ruin  of  San  Paulo’s  faqade  was 
saved  is  attributed  by  the  pious  Macaenses  only  to  prayer, 
as  the  ruin  dominates  the  city  on  an  exposed  hill.  The 
Chinese  are  zealous  custodians  of  records,  and  it  is  quite 
easy  to  secure  photographs  of  the  great  destruction.  Up 
the  Canton  and  West  Rivers  the  storm  swept,  bombard- 
ing everything  into  ruin  and  drowning  fifty  thousand  of 
the  boat  people  in  a tidal  bore  ten  feet  higher  than  spring 
tides.  Steamers  of  eight  thousand  tons  and  sailing  ships 
of  six  thousand  tons  were  hurled  up  on  the  stone  prayas. 

The  typhoon  of  1906  which  destroyed  ten  thousand 
people  came  without  telegraphic  warning  over  the  south- 
west peaks  of  Hong-Kong.  The  local  warning  of  a 
vivid  sunset  the  night  before  was  disregarded.  Harbor 
work  and  shipping  were  going  on  as  usual  in  the  early 
morning.  The  blow  began  at  nine  a.  m.  right  on  the 
echo  of  the  observatory  gun  and  was  over  at  eleven  a.  m. 
The  screams  of  the  wind  rose  above  the  cries  of  death, 
save  now  and  then  in  agonizing  lulls  when  death  alone 
spoke.  It  was  impossible  to  see  a yard  ahead.  The 
rain  came  in  torrents  undermining  everything  and  hurl- 
ing the  rocks  down  the  mountain  gulleys  as  from  a Roman 
catapult.  The  wind  caught  up  Chinese  hats  like  disci, 
together  with  native  sign-boards  with  their  wild  flash 
of  gilt  characters, — palm  trees,  tiles,  shutters,  masts  and 


358 


THE  CHINESE 


bamboo  sun  screens.  From  the  steel  walls  of  the  mighty 
war-ships  which  bucked  the  storm,  could  be  seen  a long 
procession  of  two  thousand  junks,  sampans  and  even 
steamers,  gale-driven  eastward  toward  Lyee-moon  Pass, 
and  in  the  lifts  of  the  rain-sheets  their  crews  were  be- 
held bowing  to  tablets  and  throwing  joss  prayer  boats 
overboard,  while  their  wild  faces  were  torn  with  terror. 
It  was  possible  to  help  only  a few  of  the  thousands,  for 
death  would  not  tarry  or  be  interfered  with.  No  theater 
of  Lethe  as  melancholy  has  ever  been  witnessed  from  the 
decks  of  war-ships  and  merchantmen,  whose  captains 
had  all  they  could  do  to  save  their  own  craft.  When 
the  rain-veil  parted  a moment  the  whole  mountain  side 
was  seen  to  be  leaping  white  with  cascades.  At  noon  a 
calm  came  and  in  the  places  where  it  found  them,  every 
Chinese  survivor  stood  up  so  uncomplainingly  that  all  the 
world  save  themselves  was  thrilled.  Such  is  the  stuff  the 
Hakka  boat  people  are  made  of.  Almost  the  entire 
Hong-Kong  fishing  fleet,  which  was  outside  when  the 
disaster  came,  was  lost,  and  the  little  Joss-house  at  Aber- 
deen (their  headquarters)  started  in  to  burn  for  ever 
memorial  sticks  in  the  sacred  ash  pots  before  the  shrines. 
There  are  fewer  boats  now  tied  to  the  prayas,  and  for 
a long  while  those  who  had  never  begged  before,  were 
forced  to  cry  against  their  Hakka  pride  cumshaw 
and  Chow-chow  (help  and  food).  The  work  of 
cleaning  the  harbor  was  horrible.  In  the  hot  waters, 
the  bodies  immediately  fell  to  pieces  or  were  attacked 
by  crabs.  The  Chinese  abhor  touching  the  drowned. 
They  say  a typhoon  is  “ devil  pidgin,”  and  if  they  touch 
the  devil’s  victims  he  and  they  will  turn  upon  the  in- 
trusive mortal.  An  hour  after  the  typhoon  H.  M.  famous 
cruiser,  the  Terrible,  whose  guns  saved  Ladysmith  and 


CLIMATE  AND  DISEASES 


359 


turned  the  tide  of  the  South  African  war,  came  in  from 
the  east  through  the  Lyee-moon  Pass,  and  a P.  and  O. 
mailer  arrived  through  the  west  passage,  both  reporting 
no  knowledge  of  the  storm. 

Blake  Pier,  a structure  of  iron  and  concrete,  boasted 
of  a matshed  over  its  upper  end,  where  every  foreigner 
in  the  Colony  stood  at  least  once  a day.  The  storm 
struck  it  with  a flip  of  the  wing  and  it  was  powdered 
to  dust.  Oddly  the  Sikh’s  sentry  box  was  unnoticed 
by  the  destroyer  and  defiantly  stood.  The  matshed  over 
Queen’s  Pier  came  down  like  the  clap  of  hands.  Over 
on  the  Kowloon  side,  a mile  across  the  bay  to  the  main- 
land of  China  (but  British  territory)  hundreds  of  sam- 
pans had  crept  timorously  under  the  bridge  into  the  Po- 
lice Basin.  Here  they  were  battered  to  chips  as  the 
storm  like  Hercules  leaped  into  the  herd.  Scores  of 
bodies  floated  under  the  kindling  wood.  In  the  heaving 
of  the  subsiding  waters,  heads  would  look  up  through 
the  shifting  debris  and  seem  to  be  merely  playing  hide- 
and-seek  with  death.  One  end  of  the  matshed  of  the 
Kowloon  wharf  became  a toboggan  into  the  water.  That 
noblest  terrace  of  ferns  in  all  the  world,  in  front  of  the 
Chartered  Bank  of  Australia  on  Queen’s  Road  Central, 
was  littered  with  the  roots  and  limbs  of  banyans  which 
had  fallen  from  the  heights  above.  Under  the  uprooted 
boughs  you  beheld  white-uniformed  Jackies  at  the  un- 
handy shore  work  of  hacking  out  a path.  A Spanish 
steamer  lifted  her  prow  from  the  deep  bay,  and  started 
overland  for  the  Cosmopolitan  Dock.  The  British 
cruiser  Phoenix  reared  and  backed  up  on  the  beach  of 
the  Victoria  Recreation  Club,  where  the  famous  water 
polo  games  are  held  between  the  navy  and  the  Portu- 
guese, for  treaty-port  China  boasts  of  the  world’s  great- 


360 


THE  CHINESE 


est  swimmers.  The  boats  of  the  Phoenix  on  the 
port  side  had  been  washed  away  and  from  the  davits  in- 
stead was  dangling  the  cage-like  cabin  of  a sampan,  the 
human  occupants  having  been  shaken  out,  as  they  them- 
selves used  to  shake  rats  out  of  a wicker  trap.  In  one 
hour  more  damage  was  done,  and  far  greater  loss  of  life 
occurred  than  Togo  effected  at  Tsushima  and  Round  Is- 
land. The  smallest,  prettiest  and  bravest  of  them  all, 
the  white  destroyer  Fronde  stood  out  into  the  gale  with 
that  brilliant  recklessness  of  the  French.  There  was  lit- 
tle room  on  her  curving  decks  to  take  a stand  and  fight. 
It  was  uneven;  the  storm  paused  and  grimly  laughed  as 
the  brave  little  French  vessel  was  swept  past  the  green 
bows  of  the  towering  British  ships.  Then,  pitiless,  he 
came  on  again.  Seven  white  helmeted  sailors,  with  a 
song  in  their  hearts : “ La  Rhone  et  Chine;  mes  pays;  vies 
amours,  adieu,”  were  swept  into  the  obliterating  turmoil. 

The  Japanese  mail  steamer,  Sado  Maru,  came  down 
the  coast  on  the  hem  of  the  tempest.  In  the  heav- 
ing seas  the  Japanese  captain  stopped  his  ship  twenty 
times  to  rescue  eighty  junk  people,  many  of  whom  were 
too  crazed  by  exposure  to  be  willing  to  be  saved.  The 
new  tramway  on  Hong-Kong  Island  was  commandeered 
for  the  gruesome  service  of  rushing  rude  coffins  down 
to  Ah  King’s  yacht  slipway,  which  had  been  made  into 
an  emergency  morgue.  The  whole  city,  stunned  as  it 
was,  now  rose  to  the  greater  fear  of  a pestilence  in  a 
tropic  land,  where  the  safety  of  the  survivors  depends 
on  the  dead  being  entombed  on  the  day  they  die.  Fire 
could  not  be  applied  to  rain-soaked  heaps  of  wreckage 
and  garbage.  The  danger  must  be  met;  lime  was  shov- 
eled over  them  for  the  time  being.  There  was  need  of 
speed,  for  some  said  five  thousand,  and  others  said  ten 


CLIMATE  AN'D  DISEASES  361 

thousand  had  been  drowned.  Certainly  three  thousand 
were  found  along  the  prayas,  shore  and  harbor.  The  vet- 
eran emigrant  steamer,  Charterhouse,  which,  on  her 
last  charter  had  been  plying  between  Hong-Kong  and 
Singapore  for  fifteen  years,  raced  southward  before  the 
storm  without  avail.  She  was  caught  by  midnight  and 
turned  over  like  a kettle.  Seventy  were  drowned.  The 
Scotch  engineer  and  twenty-five  Chinese  crew  were 
picked  up  three  days  afterward  on  a raft  which  was 
washed  bare  of  food  and  water.  They  endured  the 
agony  of  seeing  the  ship’s  empty  life-boats  drift  just  be- 
yond their  reach.  On  the  following  days,  silent  junks, 
like  great  catafalques  of  the  dead,  came  drifting  back 
into  the  harbor,  manned  by  an  unseen  crew,  and  spread- 
ing terror  among  others  besides  the  superstitious  Chinese. 
The  lower  revetment  walls  of  the  two  European  ceme- 
teries fell,  spilling  graves  of  the  white  man’s  dead  into 
the  Wanchai  Road,  and  over  the  upper  walls  the  Bowen 
hill  tumbled,  burying  other  graves. 

The  good  Anglican  Bishop,  J.  C.  Hoare,  who  was 
washed  in  the  typhoon  from  his  sail-boat,  the  Pioneer, 
between  Lantao  Island  and  Macao,  was  a familiar 
figure  to  us  at  Hong-Kong  Peak.  His  efforts  in 
enforced  leisure  hours  to  make  life  mentally  tolerable 
for  foreigners  by  giving  lectures,  as  well  as  his  oratory 
without  notes  in  the  Cathedral,  will  be  held  in  grateful 
memory  by  a long  line  of  English  and  American  exiles  in 
China.  His  body  went  down  under  the  cliff  where  the 
great  pioneer  missionary  Morrison  was  buried,  and.  many 
hope  that  a landmark  to  their  honor  will  be  erected  by 
those  who,  whether  for  religion’s  or  civilization’s  sake, 
have  come  to  find  bonds  about  them  holding  their  interest 
to  China. 


362 


THE  CHINESE 


Thousands  of  these  gyrating  storms  fortunately  die 
out  in  the  place  of  their  birth,  as  their  progressive  speed 
in  the  tropics  is  seldom  higher  than  ten  miles  an  hour. 
When  they  meet  the  funnel  of  the  trade-winds  they  are 
given  accelerated  progress  and  direction,  and  reach  the 
higher  latitudes  with  tremendous  impetus.  The  recog- 
nized experts  on  the  laws  of  typhoons  are  the  French 
Jesuits  of  Manila,  Sicawei,  Hong- Kong  and  Macao,  the 
most  famous  name  probably  being  that  of  Faura’s,  the 
Padre  of  the  Manila  Observatory. 

In  a country  where  the  light  is  so  bright,  sight  ie 
prized  as  Nature’s  highest  gift.  When  the  American 
boycott  was  at  its  height,  it  was  only  necessary  for  the 
bonzes  and  taotais  to  cause  the  statement  to  spread 
among  the  superstitious  masses  that  kerosene  was  bad 
for  the  eyes,  in  order  to  bring  about  a return  from  the 
American  product  to  nut-oil  illumination.  In  the  re- 
ligious riots,  the  fury  of  the  ignorant  is  most  easily 
aroused  by  circulating  the  rumor  that  the  medical  skill 
of  the  missionaries  comes  from  their  compounding  in 
their  medicines  the  eyes  of  Chinese  slave  children. 

The  natives  of  the  South  show  a diathesis  to  enlarge- 
ment of  the  spleen,  on  account  of  the  long,  hot  and 
moist  weather.  Foreigners  in  the  treaty  ports  are 
heavily  fined  if  they  kick  or  strike  a Chinese  about  the 
body,  as  death  caused  by  rupture  of  the  spleen  fre- 
quently results.  The  native  roustabouts  are  well  aware 
of  this  tendency,  and  duels  take  place,  where  the  spleen 
is  jabbed  with  the  forefinger  only.  Training  for  these 
murderous  contests  consists  in  stabbing  bags  of  rice  with 
the  fingers,  which  grow  stiff  as  iron. 


CHINESE  RELIGION  AND  SUPERSTITION 


I asked  my  cook-coolie  why  he  kept  a pet  hen  caged. 
He  replied  that  he  was  feeding  it  for  sacrifice  day.  But 
would  not  a dead  hen  do  ? “ Master,  I no  wanchee  a 

hundred  year  dam.”  The  teaching  of  Confucius  has  per- 
colated even  to  the  laboring  masses  that  conscience  is  the 
ever-present  representative  of  Tien  (the  Diety).  The 
purgatorial  figure  is  Buddhistic;  the  lively  sense  of 
morals  among  the  people  is  creditable  mainly  to  Kung 
Fut  Tsze.  When  we  think  of  China  we  must  not  think 
of  a land  which  is  solely  superstitious,  but  one  which  is 
largely  and  interestingly  religious. 

A pretty  superstition  at  Hong-Kong  is  the  purchase 
by  the  Hakka  fisher  class  of  red  effigy  prayer  boats. 
The  workmanship  is  delightfully  neat.  Loaded  with 
prayer  papers,  and  wafted  on  their  way  with  scented  joss 
sticks,  they  are  set  adrift  with  a great  clamor  of  devil- 
chasing fire-crackers,  as  the  sun  breaks  over  the  Lyee- 
moon  Hills.  The  high  sterned  junks  will  turn  their  un- 
wieldy course  rather  than  wilfully  run  down  one  of  these 
prayer  boats. 

A Chinese  dearly  loves  a motto  written  in  black  on 
red  paper.  If  it  is  the  name  of  his  god,  or  literary  an- 
cestor, he  hangs  it  over  the  family  shrine;  if  it  is  a 
maxim  of  virtue  from  strenuous  Mencius,  he  places  it 
over  his  business  counter  or  couch.  The  larger  the  let- 


364 


THE  CHINESE 


tering  and  the  bolder  the  individuality  in  the  sweep 
of  the  brush,  the  greater  the  art. 

Among  the  rice  tillers,  if  sickness  strikes  a family,  it 
is  concluded  that  the  devil  must  be  hailed  and  decoyed. 
The  Taoist  priests  come  in,  and  bang  cymbals  to  draw 
the  evil  spirit’s  attentions;  then  a dog  is  killed  and  its 
blood  is  caught  in  cups.  Lifting  these  up,  the  priests 
lead  the  procession  to  the  hills.  The  sacrifice  is  set 
down,  and  while  the  evil  spirit  is  supposed  to  be  busy 
gorging  itself,  the  procession,  with  a worldly  wisdom 
learned  from  thieves,  scatters  to  foil  the  pursuer,  the 
priest  returning  by  a roundabout  path  to  the  home,  where 
he  labels  the  door  with  red  slips  exorcising  the  evil  one. 
If,  on  the  other  hand,  the  home  of  the  mulberry  grower 
on  the  hills  is  attacked  by  misfortune,  the  procession 
wends  its  way  to  the  riverside,  where  decoy  boats  are  set 
adrift.  In  strange  quarters  the  evil  spirit  is  supposed  to 
be  more  easily  got  rid  of.  In  Korea,  two  regal  red 
chairs  are  borne  along,  the  devil  being  supposed  to  choose 
for  his  attentions  the  one  which  has,  in  place  of  a passen- 
ger, many  tempting  sweets  and  pork. 

The  purpose  of  the  prevailing  upcurling  cornices  and 
eaves  is,  of  course,  that  evil  spirits,  which  crawl  like 
snakes  on  alighting,  may  be  diverted  up  into  the  air, 
and  not  down  to  the  door  where  human  beings  enter. 
Because  of  the  habit  of  foxes  prowling  near  the  habita- 
tions of  men,  it  is  believed  among  Buddhists  that  souls 
which  decide  to  return  to  the  earth  prefer  this  animal 
for  an  abode.  If  one  who  is  always  striving  to  follow 
the  best  morals,  constantly  falls  into  evil  fortune,  the  de- 
pressing fatalism  is  repeated : “ the  gods  are  punishing 
me  for  evils  done  in  a former  life,  when  my  opportuni- 
ties for  good  were  larger  and  my  riches  greater.”  This 


RELIGION  AND  SUPERSTITION  365 


belief  is  constantly  brought  out  as  the  one  morbid  touch 
in  their  lyrics. 

The  farthest  inland  and  the  most  populous  province  is 
Szechuen,  — the  land  of  waterfalls  and  mountains, — 
which  has  seldom  been  ravaged  by  war  since  the  re- 
peopling, after  the  Ming  dynasty  was  uprooted.  Here 
Thibetan  lamasery  influence  is  now  strong.  “ Lama  su 
poll  sing”  (VVe  belong  to  the  Lamas).  But  when  the 
railway  which  the  French  are  building  into  Szechuen 
is  completed,  Canton  and  Confucianism  will  rob  Lhassa 
of  its  power  here  and  the  cairns  which  the  crawling  pil- 
grims have  raised  will  go  to  ballast  the  path  of  the 
great  leveler  and  civilizer.  The  passes  out  of  Szechuen 
to  Thibet  are  sixteen  thousand  feet  high  and  can  never 
be  profitably  graded.  So  that  far,  pounding  their  long 
muh-yu  boards,  may  the  last  trains  of  superstition  come 
with  their  yaks,  to  see  the  tide  of  progress  roll  beneath 
their  scorn;  the  faithful  kissing  the  tail  of  the  Lama’s 
pony  to  obtain  magnetic  holiness,  and  the  shamans  in 
maroon  canonicals  and  golden  underskirts,  muttering  ten 
thousand  times:  “ 0;n  Mani  Padmi  Hum”  (Oh!  Jewel 
in  the  Lotus).  You  will  notice  in  a spirit  of  irrelevant 
western  humor  that  this  saintliness  does  not  at  all  re- 
press the  pony’s  propensity  to  communicate  magnetic 
virtue  by  a quick  drive  of  the  back  heels. 

Let  us  look  for  a moment  at  a temple  of  the  Lamas. 
Into  the  plaza  around  it,  turjin  poles  are  stuck,  and  all 
the  way  up  the  poles  little  flags,  called  Lung  Ta,  flutter, 
wafting  to  Buddha  by  his  holy  wind  the  names  of  the 
dead,  for  whose  early  bliss  prayer  is  thus  made.  The 
statue  over  the  entrance  is  flanked  by  two  brass  cups,  one 
containing  rice,  the  other  oil.  On  the  altar,  stand  seven 
cups  brim  full  of  water.  The  dashingly  dressed  priests 


366 


THE  CHINESE 


carry  about  drum,  sprinkling  horn,  bell  or  book.  In  the 
dangerous  religious  gloom,  you  are  very  likely  to 
stumble  across  bones,  whether  of  buffaloes  or  humans 
it  is  hard  to  say.  The  stench  would  be  awful  were  it 
not  for  the  smoking  incense  sticks.  They  are  of  two 
colors,  six  inches  long,  the  Shi  Shang  being  black  and 
the  Mong  Shang  yellow.  Most  of  them  come  from 
my  old  home  in  Kwangtung  Province,  and  are  made  of 
sandalwood,  laka,  aniseed,  musk,  orange  peel,  ginger, 
rhubarb,  camphor,  myrrh,  cassia,  cloves  and  putchuck 
powdered  and  gummed  together.  Great  as  is  the  alti- 
tude of  eleven  thousand  feet,  buckwheat,  rye,  wheat  and 
oats  are  cultivated,  and  chickens,  goats,  and  marmots  are 
seen  about  the  dizzy  villages. 

There  might  never  have  been  a Dalai  Lama,  and  no 
abstract  dreaming  of  the  Ultimate  and  Timeless  had 
there  been  no  Himalayas  and  Snowy  and  Patroi  Ranges 
(Sacred  Mountains  as  the  zealots  call  them)  to  cage 
in  this  secluded  worship,  which  is  really  the  Saints’  or 
High  Church  of  Buddhism.  Reciprocally,  so  much  does 
Catholicism  admire  Buddha  that  he  has  been  canonized 
at  Rome.  Where  we  canonize  saints,  the  Chinese  en- 
noble their  ancestors,  long  dead,  when  the  fruits  of  their 
works  are  apparent.  The  old  Tsung  Li  Yamen  of 
Peking  got  the  Lamas  to  accord  canonization  to  two 
generations  back  of  Robert  Hart,  our  Saxon  founder  of 
the  brilliant  Imperial  Customs  Service!  The  similarity 
of  Buddhism  and  Catholicism,  in  masses,  nunneries, 
statues,  vows,  music,  exorcism,  relics,  bells,  prostration, 
incense,  and  the  use  of  dead  Sanscrit  as  the  Catholics 
use  Latin,  is  worth  remembering.  There  is  much  re- 
ligious interchange  between  Thibet  and  Shansi  Province 
in  the  north,  the  Lamas  from  the  former  often  visiting 


RELIGION  AND  SUPERSTITION  3C7 


the  Tai  Shan  shrines  which  attract  the  Orclo  and  Mongol 
tribes  from  sacred  Urga.  Shansi  is  even  permitted  to 
exhibit  a Lama,  who  is  declared  to  be  a partial  incar- 
nation, or  Gegan,  of  Buddha.  The  road  from  Ching 
Too  to  Lhassa,  one  thousand  five  hundred  miles  of  peak 
climbing,  must  for  ever  remain,  therefore,  intellectually 
the  most  unlighted  road  of  the  earth.  Like  all  moun- 
taineers, the  Thibetan  carries  his  drink  badly,  and 
tumbles  down  into  Szechuen  to  disgust  the  remainder 
of  his  race,  who  abhor  even  the  slightest  use  of  samschu. 
He  is  the  most  amiable  of  the  Chinese.  Withal,  how 
akin  we  are;  the  Lama,  paddling  his  boat  along  the  Kin- 
sha  River  on  his  way  to  the  dying,  rings  a bell,  so  that 
the  faithful  may  kowtow  and  pray  for  his  mission;  and 
the  Catholic  cure,  riding  between  the  firs  along  the  rough 
roads  of  the  Laurentian  foot-hills  of  Quebec  on  a similar 
errand,  rings  a bell  to  request  a bow  and  a Mere  de  Dieu. 
It  was  among  the  Buddhists,  and  in  a convent  at  that, 
that  the  Boxer  movement  germinated,  which  is  evening 
up  for  a Christian  convert  launching  the  Taeping  re- 
bellion. 

The  members  of  the  Chinese  Civil  Service  throughout 
asseverate  that  the  Ih  Ho  Chuan  (“United  Retaliating 
Arm,”  which  we  have  translated  into  the  famous  word 
“Boxers”)  troubles  were  precipitated  by  the  action  of 
the  Jesuit  missionaries  in  shielding  Chinese  political 
prisoners  under  the  cloak  of  their  being  proselytes;  to 
be  frank,  using  their  converts  as  “ Agents  Provoca- 
teurs.” They  also  affirm  that  the  outbreaks  of  1906, 
such  as  that  which  occurred  at  Nan  Chang  where  an 
unfortunate  mandarin  committed  suicide,  were  caused 
by  the  ambitious  policy  of  Catholic  missionaries  who 
used  government  chops  on  religious  documents  in  order 


368 


THE  CHINESE 


to  impress  converts  with  the  independent  attitude  which 
the  Catholic  Church  could  assume  toward  the  heathen 
Chinese  government.  In  fact,  the  Catholic  Church, 
known  in  China  as  the  Tien  Chu  Chiao,  is  charged  with 
an  ill-concealed  ambition  to  establish  an  imperimn  in 
imperio,  but  if  the  fault  is  the  Church’s,  it  is  the  more 
the  impudence  of  France’s  political  policy  in  China.  Her 
presumption  of  protecting  all  Catholics  in  China  should 
be  exploded,  as  was  proposed  by  the  Pope  in  1898.  She 
is  only  using  the  Catholic  Church  as  a political  tool. 
The  separation  will  be  better  for  both  parties.  The 
same  use  of  government  seals  had  much  to  do  with  the 
bitterness  which  led  to  the  famous  massacre  in  1861  at 
the  French  convent  in  Tientsin.  In  June,  1906,  the 
central  government  issued  a gazette  to  viceroys  and 
governors,  calling  attention  to  the  paragraph  in  the  new 
treaties  that  missionaries  are  not  to  be  permitted  to  in- 
terfere in  litigation  in  which  converts  are  involved.  The 
various  Chinese  ambassadors  declare  that  if  this  clause 
is  honored  conscientiously  by  the  Catholic  missionaries, 
we  shall  see  the  end  for  all  times,  of  anti-foreign  and 
anti-Christian  rioting.  This  point  has  been  again  and 
again  brought  out  by  Sir  Liang  Cheng  Tung,  himself 
a Yalensian,  in  his  speeches,  and  it  should  be  treated  by 
our  press  with  emphasis. 

Another  vexatious  source  of  altercation  has  been  the 
insistence  by  the  Catholic  missionaries  on  building  their 
chapels  and  schools  in  Gothic  architecture  on  dominating 
sites,  so  that  the  towers  shall  rise  above  the  surrounding 
native  buildings,  which  are  always  low,  as  is  illustrated  by 
the  twin  steeples  of  the  Pei  Tang  Cathedral  at  Peking, 
and  the  two  white  granite  spires  in  Canton’s  New  City. 
This  offends  the  deepest  Taoist  superstition  of  the  race. 


RELIGION  AND  SUPERSTITION  369 


Fungshui, — that  nature  worship  of  high  places  in  hilly 
country,  prominent  peninsulas  at  the  seaside,  and  bends  in 
rivers.  It  would  be  wise  for  the  church  immediately  to 
abandon  the  conflict  with  this  innocent  and  really  poetic 
belief.  The  Protestant  missionaries  declare  that  the  con- 
stant friction  of  the  Jesuits  with  the  political  affairs  of 
China,  and  their  continual  demands  that  the  central  and 
provincial  governments  shall  call  Catholic  missionaries 
mandarins,  are  jeopardizing  not  only  all  missions,  but  the 
safety  of  life  and  the  future  influence  of  all  white  men  in 
China. 

On  the  lonely  wooded  eastern  slopes  of  Pokfulum,  one 
thousand  feet  above  the  water,  on  Hong-Kong  Island, 
facing  nine  thousand  miles  wide  of  lonelier  ocean,  is  the 
retreat  and  headquarters  of  the  daring  Catholic  propa- 
ganda in  south  China.  Above  the  camphors,  banyans, 
firs  and  bananas,  amid  the  dank  smells  of  ferns,  tube- 
roses and  ivy,  over  the  terraced  tombs  of  the  Brothers, 
look  the  dormer  windows  of  the  beautiful  Gothic  pile 
(formerly  Douglas  Castle)  of  refectory,  printing  house, 
chapel,  and  monastery  of  the  Missiones  D’Etrangeres, 
white  and  quiet  in  an  alien  scene.  When  the  prostrating 
sun  declines,  the  brothers  emerge  for  exercise.  Some 
wear  white  topy-helmets,  and  long  coats  of  alpaca,  called 
soutanes,  and  the  scene  is  enlivened  for  others  have 
adopted  the  queue,  felt-soled  shoes,  and  the  brighter  robes 
of  the  natives.  The  ruling  Chinese  vastly  despise  this 
condescension,  but  it  is  popular  with  the  people  them- 
selves. In  the  days  of  Xavier  and  Ricci,  the  Jesuits  in 
China  adopted  the  yellow  robes  of  Buddhist  monks,  but  on 
being  jeered  upon  the  counterfeit,  they  have  since  worn 
the  blue  and  lilac  robes  of  the  literati,  and  in  this,  and  per- 
mitting the  Chinese  to  retain  ancestor  worship,  the  official 


370 


THE  CHINESE 


Chinese  believe  that  Catholicism  admits  that  it  has  not 
come  to  establish  a new  religion,  but  to  add  culture  and  a 
political  system.  The  Missiones  D’Etrangeres  is  one 
of  the  heaviest  stock-holders  (holding  half  a million)  in 
the  lucrative  Tanjong  Pagar  Wharves  and  Dock  of 
Singapore. 

There  is  no  reason  why  Protestant  missions  should 
not  permit  the  ancestor  tablets  to  remain  in  the 
home  for  memory’s  sake,  in  the  respect  that  we  hang 
photographs,  but  of  course  the  incense  stick  should  be 
forbidden.  When  we  speak  of  Protestant  missions  and 
Christian  literature  in  China,  one  name  ahead  of  all 
comes  forward,  that  of  Robert  Morrison,  the  first  and 
greatest  Protestant  missionary,  who  lies  buried  in  that 
little  square,  high-walled  cemetery  at  Macao  over  the 
grand  Areia  Preta  beach.  His  translation  of  the  Holy 
Scriptures  in  twenty-one  volumes,  completed  in  1823, 
remains  the  foundation  stone  of  Chinese  missions. 
What  a labor  that  was  in  surreptitiously  chiseling  on 
blocks  of  tin  in  the  East  India  Company’s  local  office 
the  thousands  of  characters,  the  meaning  of  which  he 
was  almost  the  first  to  unlock,  and  certainly  the  first  so 
generously  to  apply.  The  Nestorians  in  A.  D.,  505,  and 
again  in  780,  and  the  Jesuits  Ricci  and  Ruggiero  in 
1580,  and  Schaal  under  Shun  Che’s  patronage  in  1661, 
had  the  same,  indeed  a better  opportunity,  but  it  re- 
mained for  Morrison  to  give  the  Book  (the  “Way” 
they  call  it)  to  the  Chinese,  and  leave  the  truth  to  the  con- 
sciences of  the  people,  to  be  watered  by  their  own  cares 
and  sorrows.  lie  was  wisely  willing  to  let  meddlers, 
not  missionaries,  in  an  arrogation  of  temporal  authority, 
interfere  with  Rule  or  Misrule.  To  his  name  scholars 
also  bow  for  his  compendious  dictionary  of  Chinese. 


RELIGION  AND  SUPERSTITION 


371 


It  is  marked  that  missionaries  receive  little  sympathy 
from  white  men  resident  in  China.  In  extenuation  it  is 
pointed  out  that  this  should  not  be  wholly  laid  to  the  lat- 
ter’s spiritual  condition  which  remains  in  a suspended 
state.  The  eyes  of  the  alien  layman  are  in  the  back  of 
his  head,  looking  longingly  toward  home.  He  is  not 
enthusiastic  on  even  the  letters  of  China,  and  hardly  in 
the  notable  scenery.  He  is  engrossed  in  a race  to 
make  money  rapidly  against  the  speeding  ravages  of 
an  enen-ating  climate.  The  fact  remains  that  missions 
must  look  to  America  and  England  for  that  love  which 
more  than  money  speeds  their  feet  along,  in  following 
the  path  through  China  first  trod  by  the  Apostle  Thomas. 
America  should  for  years  send  none  but  medical  mis- 
sionaries to  China.  The  London  Mission  hospital  at 
Peking  is  an  example  of  what  should  be  copied  through- 
out the  land. 

In  a corner  of  Mongolia  near  Turkestan,  at  Turpan, 
in  an  excavation,  old  boots  have  been  found  which  were 
repaired  with  kid  palimpsests  of  the  third  century,  A.  D., 
— a literal  example  of  the  truth  marching  into  be- 
nighted Cathay.  On  what  other  Tartar’s  long  boots, 
borrowed  from  an  Osmanli  brother,  have  been  sewed 
those  lost  treasures  of  the  West,  the  palimpsests  of 
Sappho’s  poems,  and  the  missing  chapters  of  Livy  and 
Cicero?  Speaking  of  relics,  the  enlightened  governor 
of  Shensi  headed  a procession  from  an  open  field  outside 
Sianfu  in  the  fall  of  1907,  which  bore  the  sacred  Nes- 
torian  tablet  for  the  first  time  in  eleven  and  one-half 
centuries,  under  a roof  within  the  Peilin  Temple  of  Si- 
anfu. As  is  well  known,  the  two  thousand  Chinese  and 
Syrian  characters  of  this  stone  record  the  communion 
with  the  fifth  century  Christian  Church,  and  the  deposit 


372 


THE  CHINESE 


in  the  Sianfu  library  of  part  of  the  translated  Bible.  The 
notable  fact  is  to  be  recorded  here  that  this  year  a replica 
of  the  Nestorian  tablet  was  placed  in  the  Metropolitan 
Museum  of  New  York  City. 

Thirty  miles  southwest  from  Macao  lies  the  island  of 
Chang  Chuen,  where  the  pioneer  missionary  Xavier  died. 
Shortly  after  leaving  Shanghai  on  the  southward  voyage 
you  pass  Phu  Tho  on  the  starboard,  to  land  where  would 
be  a task  requiring  Pauline  zeal,  for  the  whole  island  is 
given  up  to  a hundred  monasteries  occupied  by  thou- 
sands of  mumbling  bonzes.  It  is  to  the  Chinese  what 
Philse  was  to  the  Egyptians. 

The  nationalism  of  China  owes  everything  to  Con- 
fucianism, with  its  great  teachings  of  the  immortality  of 
the  soul’s  conscience;  Hiao  (filial  piety) ; Chung  (obedi- 
ence to  virtuous  rulers)  ; its  eternal  insistence  on  Shim 
(personal  character) ; duties  more  than  faith,  and  op- 
position to  caste.  Ancestor  worship  was,  of  course, 
founded  by  Confucius,  and  remains  the  most  unique 
feature  of  Chinese  customs.  Confucianism  exempts  no 
position,  taking  ground  as  forward  as  the  Roman  Cen- 
sor Morum,  Commune  or  Duma,  even  to  the  granite 
seat  of  the  throne : “ Vice  dethrones  the  divine  right  in 
a ruler.”  According  to  a Confucian  sermonette : “ The 
seed  of  Heaven  or  hell  is  all  sown  in  this  life,”  and  again, 
the  Ming  Tsien  Chi  says:  “If  you  practise  good  works 
here  you  need  not  worry  about  your  future.”  These 
teachings  have  made  the  race  the  eternal  adamant  it  is 
to-day,  founded,  of  course,  on  tablets  of  a different  color, 
but  not  so  much  of  a different  grain  from  those  of  Moses; 
stones  indeed  of  strength  and  ready  to  hold  the  super- 
structure of  whatever  new  commercial,  industrial  or  re- 
ligious civilization  may  be  laid  upon  them.  Like  the 


RELIGION  AND  SUPERSTITION  373 


Romans  of  the  Republic,  the  Confucians  in  temples, 
streets  and  mottoes  exalt  the  fame  of  the  leading  virtues, 
calling  them  “Most  Excellent  Truth”;  “Heavenly 
Aid  “ Beneficent  Concord,”  etc.  No  weaklings,  there- 
fore, such  a race.  What  they  are  now  they  have  always 
been,  and  will  always  be.  We  need  not  fear  for  their 
sincerity  in  the  future.  Judge  of  the  morals  of  a people 
whose  business  men  paste  on  their  shop  doors  mottoes 
for  the  New  Year  such  as:  “ May  I manage  my  occu- 

pation according  to  truth  and  loyalty,”  and  “ May  I 
uphold  benevolence  and  rectitude  in  all  my  trading.” 
Ov^er  a temple  at  Canton  is  the  inscription : “ Right  and 

Wrong  are  blended  on  earth,  but  separated  in  Heaven.” 
Mottoes  and  empty  spirit  seats  take  the  place  of  Bud- 
dhistic statues  in  Confucian  temples. 

With  the  advent  of  modern  learning,  especially  while 
Japan  influences  her, — beautiful,  dreamy,  metaphysical 
Buddhism  of  the  temples,  with  its  bezoar  amulets  and  its 
teaching  of  faith  more  than  duties,  will  recede  into  desue- 
tude, and  China  will  adapt  for  national  uses  the  amended 
Confucianism.  Confucianism  will  add  to  its  creed  that  to 
serve  the  State  is  to  be  sure  of  immortality,  on  which  lat- 
ter subject  it  has  previously  been  as  hazy  as  Buddhism 
was  replete.  Confucianism  will  become  picturesque,  or 
humorous  in  its  patriotism  (dependent  on  the  oriental 
or  occidental  view)  and  issue  bulls  deifying  its  heroes. 
But  all  the  aestheticism  of  the  classics  that  has  been  cul- 
tivated in  the  past  will  be  neglected  for  the  new  militant 
Confucianism,  which  in  this  respect  alone  can  be  com- 
pared to  the  Shintoism  of  Japan.  The  superiority  over 
the  more  clever  Shintoistic  Japanese  which  the  Chinese 
have  enjoyed,  in  that  breadth  of  character  which  philos- 
ophy produces,  is  creditable  to  Confucianism.  In  col- 


374 


THE  CHINESE 


lecting  the  philosophy  and  poetry;  in  codifying  the 
manners,  and  in  adding  to  them  riches  of  his  own  in  the 
Book  of  History;  The  Odes;  Spring  and  Autumn  An- 
nals, Confucius  or  Kung  (as  Mencius  unlatinized  is 
Mang),  has  been  the  Homer  and  Chesterfield  of  the 
Asiatics,  and  in  the  Book  of  Rites  he  has  been  their 
Moses.  As  was  Plato  to  Socrates,  so  was  Chu  Hi  to 
Confucius,  and  the  sublime  academic  groves  at  Nankang 
in  Nganwei  Province  draw  the  feet  of  thousands  of 
religious  and  literary  pilgrims  every  year.  An  interest- 
ing bit  of  stoical  philosophy  of  the  Confucian  school  re- 
futes the  Occidental’s  argument  concerning  prayer: 

“ God  answers  no  individual.  He  merely  has  given  a 
memory  to  mankind  in  the  aggregate  to  avenge  accumu- 
lated wrongs;  thus  cycle  by  cycle  man  achieves  his  own 
advancement  with  the  passive  approval  of  God,  who  for- 
bears ever  to  interfere  after  He  once  created  the  human 
mind.”  Another  Confucian  said  to  me:  “You  Occi- 

dentals worship  Eternity  in  the  past,  we  believe  in  the 
Immortality  of  an  endless  human  succession.”  Then  I 
asked  myself  if  West  and  East  in  matters  of  the  spiritual 
after  all  may  not  be  going  around  one  circle  to  a meeting 
point  in  the  one  Judginent  of  all  Virtue,  which  will 
weigh  these  two  peoples  who  come,  one  from  the  right 
hand  and  one  from  the  left,  by  the  two  rules,  those  from 
the  West  by  conduct,  and  those  from  the  East  by  con- 
science. 

Oddly  the  religion  of  Fo  or  Buddhism,  with  its  cen- 
sers, crosiers,  holy  water,  extension  of  hands  in  blessing 
and  manumission  of  sins,  is  the  religion  of  a few  dare- 
devil, camel-riding,  dirty  Mongols  of  the  northwest  prov- 
inces. While  Confucianism  puts  the  stigma  of  inferi- 
ority on  women.  Buddhism  recognizes  her  religiously 


Characteristic  Manchuan  sign-poles  on  the  wide  main  street  of 
Mukden,  the  birthplace  of  the  reigning  dvnastv. 


Great  bell  tower.  Temple  of  Five  Genii,  Canton,  South  China. 


m 

M 

r>M 

Christian  converts  herded  in  the  .\postolic  Mission  durinsr  the  battle 
of  'I'ientsin  between  the  Uoxers  and  the  foreign  :dh«'. 

The  converts  were  unllinchingly  loval  to  their  teachers 
and  religion,  both  Protestant  and  C atholic, 
during  the  hloixly  days  of  ipoo. 


RELIGION  AND  SUPERSTITION 


375 


and  socially.  Accordingly  Buddhism’s  strength  in  China 
is  in  the  hearts  of  the  women.  It  was  Buddhism  which 
brought  most  of  the  present  art  into  China,  and  also 
evidences  of  Greek  influence,  which  we  find  occasionally 
in  the  architecture  of  joss  houses  and  the  Greek  inter- 
locking gold  border  used  on  tunics.  Buddhism  endowed 
China’s  literature  with  imagination,  and  is  the  mother 
of  her  short  novels.  Buddhism  has  been  instrumental  in 
teaching  the  masses  patience  in  their  poverty,  because 
in  some  future  life  they  will  receive  rewards.  One  weak- 
ness of  Buddhism  in  China  has  been  that  her  official 
language  is  Sanscrit.  Not  since  the  twelfth  century 
have  her  theological  productions  been  virile.  The  poet- 
ical mysticism  of  Buddhism  can  be  judged  by  its  emblem, 
the  lotus,  and  the  interpretation  of  its  teachers : “ It 

grows  from  the  slime  and  expands  in  glory  over  the  dark, 
filthy  waters  which  hold  it;  so  shall  we  expand  in  the 
bles.sed  Nirvana.” 

Miracles  are  believed  in;  the  favorite  one  recited  be- 
ing of  the  righteous  lad,  Wu  Mang  Tsang,  whose  poor 
mother  was  dying  for  the  lack  of  sustenance,  which  he 
was  unable  to  purchase  and  would  not  steal.  In  his 
despair,  he  went  to  the  bamboo  brake  to  weep.  Al- 
though it  was  winter,  pitying  Heaven  (Tien)  made  the 
tears  to  bring  forth  tender  shoots  of  bamboo,  which  he 
brought  home  and  boiled, — a parallel  with  our  Elijah 
and  the  Ravens  parable.  Their  Virgin  Mother,  whose 
statue  shows  her  outstretching  many  arms  of  charity,  is 
called  “ Tze  Pei  Kun  Yam,”  merciful  hearer  of  prayers, 
and  a notable  temple  is  erected  to  her  honor  in  Canton. 
Buddhist  temples  are  generally  known  by  the  name  of 
“ Three  Chiefs,”  referring  to  the  three  incarnations  of 
Buddha.  Buddhist  nunneries  are  not  infrequently  met 


376 


THE  CHINESE 


with.  Travelers  will  particularly  remember  the  one  in 
the  picturesque  Shui  Hing  gorge  of  the  Sikiang  (West 
River).  Strong  believers  in  marriage,  the  government 
has  never  looked  with  favor  on  the  increase  of  these 
institutions.  The  infants  thrown  into  the  baby  towers 
of  silence,  largely  come  from  their  unhallowed  halls. 
The  Buddhists  always  select  the  most  conspicuous  sites, 
and  which  have  been  most  adorned  by  nature,  for  their 
temples.  At  Honam,  across  the  Macao  passage  from 
Canton,  they  cremate  the  bodies  of  their  priests.  In 
a compound  of  the  temple  they  give  a refuge  to  pigs, 
which  are  overfed  until  a natural  death  releases  them, 
the  intent  being  to  show  toward  the  lowest  of  animals 
respect  for  the  principle  of  breathing  life.  In  Mongolia, 
after  saying  his  prayer,  the  Buddhist  votary  leaves  his 
handkerchief  as  an  earnest  of  his  vows. 

Modern  books  of  Buddhist  sermons  are  procurable. 
Each  sermon  is  divided  into  eight  heads.  The  homely 
virtues  are  wreathed  in  noble,  poetic  settings,  and  the 
literary  beauty  and  power  of  some  of  these  homilies  are 
not  surpassed  by  our  best  products.  Characteristic  of 
the  democracy  of  the  teacher  and  his  hearers,  some  ser- 
mons close ; “ This  has  been  a long  parable ; we’ll  stop  and 
take  a pipe.”  Our  Peoples’  Institutes  have  therefore  had 
forerunners  on  remote  paths  we  hardly  should  have 
dreamed  of.  Cynics  here,  too,  have  their  fling  at  re- 
ligion, for  says  one : “ When  the  old  cat’s  eyes  close  in 
prayer  to  Buddha,  my  cheese  is  safe.” 

Buddhism’s  doctrine  of  the  transmigration  of  souls, 
whereby  a man  may  become  an  animal  hereafter,  and 
that  the  animal  before  our  sight  was  a man  in  a former 
state,  is,  of  course,  a most  pernicious  and  immoral  teach- 
ing. Its  half  beauty,  in  that  it  inculcates  love  of  animal 


RELIGION  AND  SUPERSTITION  377 


life,  is  like  the  iridescence  that  attracts  in  the  grass,  but 
is  found  to  glitter  from  a snake’s  coils. 

Taoism,  outside  of  its  one  brilliant  classic,  the  Tao 
Teh  King  of  Li  Erh  (who  is  best  known  by  his  cog- 
nomen of  Lao  Tsz,  “old  teacher”)  its  founder,  is  as 
much  akin  to  a folk-lore,  like  the  Scandinavian  myths, 
as  to  a religion,  with  its  elaborate  tales  of  genii,  dryads, 
goblins,  sprites,  demons  and  gods.  Their  priests  are  the 
autocrats  of  the  powerful  Fungshui  geomancy.  If  only 
the  Chinese  were  dramatically  musical,  they  have  the 
libretta  in  their  voluminous  mythology  for  a native  Wag- 
ner, especially  in  the  great  “ Hill  and  River  classic.” 
Taoism  admits  that  the  world  would  be  pleasant  enough 
as  it  is,  were  it  not  for  the  terrible  rule  of  the  spirits  of 
our  dead  over  us.  When  an  evil  spirit  is  adjured,  the 
north  is  faced,  for  that  is  the  way  shadows  fall.  The 
south,  too,  has  some  ill  luck  phases,  for  from  that  quarter 
are  said  to  come  droughts,  fires  and  typhoons. 

The  sect  has  a weird  ceremony,  showing  how  Buddhism 
interlocks  with  their  system,  called  “ Breaking  Hell 
Open,”  where  a light  is  sent  to  the  departed  spirit  among 
the  Pretas.  The  priests  request  the  god  “ to  send  a pro- 
cession with  streaming  banners  to  show  the  spirit  the  way 
to  the  golden  bridge  which  crosses  over  to  bliss.”  The 
Taoist  priests  may  marry;  the  Buddhists,  of  course,  may 
not.  The  Pope  of  Taoism  resides  on  Tiger  Mountain  in 
Kiang-si  Province,  and  is  reputed  to  be  in  touch  con- 
tinually with  the  revelation  of  wonders ; hence  the  spread 
of  Taoistic  superstition,  especially  in  Szechuen  and 
Hupeh.  Dark  as  it  is,  Tao  means  the  “ way.”  Trees 
are  worshipped ; all  through  Shansi  Province  in  the  north 
you  will  notice  red  votive  streamers  attached  to  the  wide 
branches  of  a species  of  oak.  They  believe  that  all 


378 


THE  CHINESE 


kinds  of  matter  have  souls,  and  that  a year  of  our  time 
is  a thousand  years  of  the  soul’s  time,  so  intensely  do 
spirits  live.  It  is  remarkable  that  they  have  a Prome- 
theus myth,  for  Sui  Jin  is  said  to  have  brought  fire  down 
from  Tien  (Heaven).  Their  Adam  (Pwan  Ku)  is  rep- 
resented as  coming  from  Heaven  in  the  form  of  a giant, 
and  they  believe  that  for  a long  while  there  were  giants 
on  earth  (our  Titan  myth).  The  Taoist  priests  are  rec- 
ognizable by  gray  and  blue  robes  in  distinction  to  the 
saffron  and  pink  robes  of  the  Buddhists.  The  former, 
unlike  the  latter,  are  not  shaven.  Taoism  can  hardly  be 
said  to  have  an  ethical  mission ; it  is  rather  a prostration 
in  fear  before  the  wonderful  and  supernatural.  It  has 
done  more  to  depress  the  courage,  alarm  the  imagination, 
and  make  the  race  impractical  than  any  other  influence 
in  China. 

If,  in  one  comparison,  the  religion  of  the  East  and 
Christianity  are  to  be  discussed,  it  may  be  said  that  the 
former  prescribes  the  duty  of  class;  the  latter  the  duty 
of  the  individual.  One  Chinese  may  indulge  in  the  San 
Chiao  (all  three  of  their  religions).  They  have  a say- 
ing : “ .When  all  is  well  and  you  wish  it  to  stay  well,  be 

an  ethical  Confucian;  when  in  trouble,  seek  the  super- 
natural Taoists;  when  you  die,  let  the  atonement-pro- 
curing Buddhists  be  called  in.” 

In  the  British  alliance  with  Buddhistic  Japan,  and 
what  may  almost  be  called  a consequent  alliance  with 
Buddhistic  China,  Britain  strengthened  herself  immensely 
in  the  affections  of  Buddhistic  India,  which  has  a keen 
affiliation  with  the  Buddhists  of  China.  She  thus  raised 
another  arm  to  keep  in  subjection  India’s  sixty  million 
Mohammedans,  about  whose  rebel  hearts  is  always  folded 
closest  the  green  standard  of  the  Prophet,  which  is  ready 


RELIGION  AND  SUPERSTITION 


379 


to  unfurl  at  the  first  throb,  as  seen  in  Armenia  in  1909. 
No  nation  knows  better  the  inner  spirit  of  this  sect,  which 
they  call  Kei  Chiao,  than  the  Cliinese,  for  when  the  gov- 
ernment was  busy  with  the  great  Taeping  rebellion,  sud- 
denly all  Mohammedan  Kansu  and  Shensi  arose  in  the 
northwest,  and  the  extirpation  of  the  green  fires  of  the 
Prophet’s  war  camps  was  one  of  the  most  vexatious  un- 
dertakings in  recent  Chinese  history. 

In  Mongolia,  the  government  has  had  to  use  arms 
and  bribes  alternately  to  keep  in  check  the  Mohammedan 
Tungani  tribes.  In  Yunnan,  the  Mohammedan  Puntais 
called  a Ghazi  or  holy  war  and  no  settlement  could  be 
found  of  the  difficulties  until  every  living  Mohammedan 
was  driven  into  Burmah.  Many  have  now  returned  to 
Yunnan,  where  they  are  engaged  mainly  in  the  fur  trade. 

Standing  high  above  the  low  buildings  of  Hang-chow 
(the  bore  city)  you  will  notice  the  minaret  of  a mosque 
whose  preservation  through  the  surging  times  of  the 
Taepings  in  1863  speaks  loud  for  religious  toleration 
in  China,  for  this  coastal  city  is  the  farthest  removed 
from  the  centers  of  Islamism.  At  the  north  gate  of 
Canton  stands  the  Kwang  Tah  minaret,  one  thousand 
years  old,  a memorial  to  the  Prophet’s  uncle,  whom  Can- 
ton claims.  The  numerous  Mohammedan  tribes  of  Mon- 
golia have  more  of  a reputation  for  singing  and  eating 
than  for  industry.  It  is  an  odd  sight  to  see  the  blue- 
capped  Chinese  muezzins  mounting  the  minarets. 

The  Great  Thanksgiving  Day,  the  ritual  climax  of 
the  year,  is  the  Feast  of  Lanterns,  occurring  on  the  fif- 
teenth day  of  the  first  moon  (February),  when  the  Em- 
peror on  behalf  of  his  people  goes  up  those  uncovered 
altar  steps  to  worship  the  Imperial  God  of  Heaven 
(Hwang  Tien).  In  times  of  drought,  and  visitations 


38o 


THE  CHINESE 


of  typhoons,  the.  trials  of  criminals  are  hurried,  lest 
Heaven  should  have  been  offended  by  delayed  justice  on 
earth.  The  prayer  of  the  Emperor,  who  is  dressed  in 
blue,  because  he  is  worshipping  the  High  God  who  dwells 
above  the  cerulean,  shows  some  of  the  sonorous  solemnity 
of  the  old  Hebrew  Prophets ; “ Oh ! Imperial  Heaven, 

looking  up  I consider  that  Thy  heart  is  benevolence  and 
love.  With  trembling  and  anxiety  I would  not  rashly 
assail  Thy  footstool,  but  would  first  consider  my  errors. 
I would  inquire  if  I have  swept  away  one  poor  man’s 
field  to  add  to  a monarch’s  park.  Have  the  oppressed 
had  no  appeal?  For  the  gluttony  of  bribes,  has  the 
blood  of  the  innocent  been  spilt?  Have  the  gleaners 
been  pushed  into  the  ditches,  by  the  powerful,  to  starve? 
Have  our  enemies  been  left  to  trample  on  my  flock  as 
mire  and  ashes?  Oh,  lay  the  plumb  line  to  my  sins  and 
teach  me  duty.  Grant  me  renovation  for  the  sake  of 
my  myriad  innocent.”  This  strenuous  self-searching,  set 
in  rugged  poetry,  is  truly  Davidian,  Cromwellian,  or 
Rooseveltian,  as  one’s  taste  may  say. 

The  Chinese  are  not  always  patient  with  their  gods, 
which  cost  each  inhabitant  one  dollar  and  a half  Mexican 
a year.  If  drought  continues;  if  the  fisheries  are  poor; 
should  a bonze  become  unpopular, — revenge  is  taken  first 
upon  the  idol,  gilt  and  fearsome  as  he  is.  “ Thou  pig  of 
a spirit;  thou  art  well  gilt,  incense-smoked,  set  firm  and 
high,  fed  tight  as  a drum-head,  yet  thou  givest  up  noth- 
ing. Thou  wooden  thing  so  impotent  that  thou  canst 
not  wipe  off  the  webs  which  the  insolent  spiders  spin 
over  thine  eyes ; thou  harborer  of  filthy  rats’  nests  in  thy 
bowels,  we  spew  thee;”  and  forthwith  the  idol  is  las- 
soed and  dethroned.  The  bonze  is  then  beaten.  The 
temples  are  never  closed.  They  crown  every  prominence. 


RELIGION  AND  SUPERSTITION  381 


To  the  Buddhists  alone  these  poor  people  give  six  hun- 
dred million  dollars  a year.  Confucianism,  which  ethic- 
ally and  religiously  has  done  more  for  the  nation,  has 
asked  for  comparatively  nothing. 

The  dragon  is  not  only  the  emblem  of  China,  he  is 
a god,  the  great  spirit  of  mountain  and  air,  the  supporter 
of  the  Middle  Kingdom  of  this  supposedly  flat  earth. 
His  retreats  must  not  be  impiously  disturbed,  says  the 
Taoist  Fungshui  geomancy.  Our  happiness  depends 
upon  his  somnolence,  and  his  sleep  depends  upon  our 
virtues,  especially  obedience  to  tried  and  honored  cus- 
toms. In  other  words,  as  the  Chinese  like  as  few  re- 
minders as  possible  from  their  rulers,  they  likewise  ap- 
preciate their  gods  most  when  they  hear  the  least  from 
them. 

At  Ue  Chau,  a village  on  the  Rhine  of  China, — the 
Sikiang, — four  hours  by  launch  west  of  Canton,  an 
Episcopal  mission  hall  has  been  raised  with  a name  in 
conformity  with  the  Chinese  taste  for  the  grandiloquent. 
It  is  called  “ The  House  of  the  Illustrious  Teaching.” 
This  slight)  accedance  to  Chinese  customs  is  a wise  move. 

At  midnight  of  the  first  moon,  which  begins  the  New 
Year,  the  father  leads  his  whole  household  to  the  door. 
Lanterns  are  lifted  up,  and  all  bow  before  Heaven  and 
toward  earth,  in  solemn  worship  of  nature’s  God.  An- 
other beautiful  nature  ceremony  is  the  pouring  of  liba- 
tions, when  favors  are  asked  for  the  growth  of  the  grain 
in  the  field.  At  the  northern  boundary  of  the  farm, 
whence  enter  all  evil  spirits,  is  placed  a statue  of  Buddha, 
in  the  same  manner  that  the  Romans  set  up  Terminal 
statues  of  deities. 

The  expressions  of  mankind  the  world  over,  after  all, 
reveal  the  similarity  of  the  human  heart,  when  its  sor- 


382 


THE  CHINESE 


rows  drive  it  to  poetry.  The  proclamation  of  the  pres- 
ent  Regent  employs  the  following  language  in  reference 
to  the  demise  of  the  late  monarch : “ He  who  has  now 

gone  the  Great  Journey.”  Would  not  this  equally  well 
serve  as  a metaphor  for  North  American  Indian,  or  Cau- 
casian ? 

By  different  names,  but  in  a similar  worship  of  patron 
saints,  China  accords  with  the  rest  of  us.  As  the  sailors 
of  Brittany  and  Marseilles  pray  before  the  shrine  of 
“ Notre  Dame  de  la  Garde,”  or  the  raftsmen  of  Montreal 
to  “ Notre  Dame  de  Bonsecours,”  the  fishermen  of  China, 
most  of  whom  are  Buddhists,  for  dangerous  vocations 
call  for  a picturesque  faith, — bow  to  the  Venerable 
Mother  Ma  Tsu  (i.  e.,  Maya,  mother  of  Buddha)  for 
succor.  The  most  conspicuous  temple  outside  the  walls 
of  Ningpo  is  erected  to  her  name,  and  her  worship  is 
principal  in  the  bonze-ridden  island  of  Phu-Tho,  in  the 
Chusan  group.  Throughout  sea-faring  Fu-kien  you  come 
across  her  shrines.  She  is  the  Athena  of  the  Chinese. 
At  Canton  she  goes  by  another  name,  Kun  Yam  (God- 
dess of  Mercy),  a temple  on  a hill,  erected  in  the  fif- 
teenth century,  being  dedicated  to  her.  The  sightseer 
will  not  soon  forget  the  great  flight  of  stone  steps,  both 
to  this  heathen  temple,  and  to  the  Christian  ruins  of  San 
Paulo  at  Macao. 

Singularly  Mosaic  is  that  part  of  the  worship  at  the 
Altar  of  Pleaven,  when  the  Emperor  commands  a bul- 
lock which  is  without  blemish  to  be  burned  whole  upon 
the  porcelain  altar  as  a sacrifice  to  the  God  of  the  Sky. 
In  the  case  of  the  bullock  brought  to  the  Altar  of  the 
Earth,  the  animal  is  buried,  not  burned. 

Too  little  attention  has  been  paid  to  the  vicarious 
heroism  of  Chinese  morals.  A son  may  offer  himself 


RELIGION  AND  SUPERSTITION  383 


for  imprisonment,  to  free  a father,  and  it  is  legal  to 
punish  relatives  where  an  individual  is  considered  to 
have  placed  too  great  an  onus  of  crime  on  a community. 
The  family  is  responsible  for  the  individual’s  debts,  with 
the  result  that  there  are  few  bankruptcies,  the  family 
taking  the  place  of  the  government  in  restraining  in- 
dividual defalcation.  Thefts  are  punished  by  the  family, 
and  not  the  magistrate, — the  clansmen  whipping  the  cul- 
prit along  the  highroad.  The  principle  of  “ Filial 
Duty  ” is  not  only  religious.  It  is  the  political  and 
ethical  foundation  stone  of  the  nation  itself.  The  man- 
darin is  instructed  to  act  “ as  a parent  to  the  people.” 
China  has  possessed  an  easy-going  central  government, 
because  it  needed  little  other,  so  long  as  it  withheld  from 
dealing  with  the  Occident.  The  ninety  million  family 
w'heels,  all  of  one  pattern,  going  at  one  speed,  to  the  same 
end,  and  by  the  same  simple  impetus,  worked  in  their  own 
circles  without  conflict,  because  they  did  not  overlie. 
There  are  no  billionaire  wheels  in  the  State,  keyed  to 
a billion-metre  speed  in  conscience  and  privilege,  to  up- 
set the  balance  of  the  other  wheels.  It  was  not  desired 
to  produce  even  great  men,  much  less  pow'erful  ones,  but 
rather  uncompetitive  happiness  and  uniformity. 

Murderers  cut  off  the  hand  or  foot  of  their  victims, 
and  place  it  in  the  mouth  of  the  despatched.  The  super- 
stition is  that  this  prevents  the  spirit  of  the  dead  from 
following  the  desperadoes  through  this  life.  As  near 
Canton  as  the  defile  of  Yan  Ping,  eight  of  these  victims 
of  Hakka  brigands  were  discovered  in  April,  1907.  It  is 
very  common  to  hear  among  one’s  native  friends  at  Hong- 
Kong  lament  for  members  of  their  families  who  have 
been  kidnapped  and  probably  taken  to  the  defiles  of  Yan 
Ping,  San  Ning  or  Hoi  Ping,  while  emissaries  go  to  and 


384 


THE  CHINESE 


fro  between  the  capturers  and  the  relatives  of  the  cap- 
tive, discussing  terms  of  ransom. 

As  near  the  vortex  of  commerce  as  Bowen  Road, 
which  hangs  over  mountainous  Hong-Kong,  one  may  see 
native  women  bowing  on  the  open  hill  before  stones  in 
their  Taoist  faith.  You  will  notice  a well-worn  path 
winding  up  the  mount,  and  a jutting  rock  which  throws 
its  shadow  over  the  road.  The  sampan  women  of  the 
Hakka  tribe  believe  that  the  Being,  one-third  of  whom 
is  resident  in  prominent  stones,  has  power  to  affect  the 
fortune  and  the  motherhood  of  sons.  Part  of  the  wor- 
ship consists  in  sitting  on  the  stone.  The  stone  is  some- 
times given  a name,  and  letters  are  painted  on  it,  but 
there  is  no  bonze  in  attendance.  While  jade  is  the  fash- 
ionable jewel  and  “ good-luck  ” stone,  meteorites  are 
worshipped  in  Pechili  and  Manchuria,  because  they  come 
from  Tien  (Pleaven).  The  same  idea  of  veneration 
crossed  the  Aleutians,  and  is  noticeable  among  the  Es- 
quimaux. The  immense  meteorite  of  pure  iron  in  the 
Natural  History  Museum,  New  York  City,  which  was 
brought  to  the  United  States  by  the  explorer  Peary,  shows 
evidences  of  having  been  chipped  by  the  Esquimaux  for 
amulets. 

China  has  its  pilgrimage,  with  a fair  adjunct,  just 
as  Mecca  and  Benares  have.  In  Confucius’  country, 
the  road  to  Tai  Shan  Mount,  near  Tsi  Nan,  where  the 
saintly  Shun  is  reputed  to  have  instituted  sacrifices  to 
Heaven,  is  lined  with  booths,  and  those  who  pass  by  on 
their  knees  return  erect,  to  buy  and  sell.  The  suppliant 
who  crawls  along,  begging  you  in  his  piety  to  step  on 
him,  will  mark  you  out  and  drive  the  harder  bargain 
on  his  return,  for  your  having  done  so. 

Their  art  portrays  only  one  being  comparable  to  our 


RELIGION  AND  SUPERSTITION  385 


w'ingecl  angels,  i.  e.,  Lui  Kung,  the  God  of  Thunder,  who 
always  appears  with  wings.  We  pour  ridicule  upon  the 
attempts  of  the  Chinese  to  express  their  idea  of  the 
Creator,  and  we  laud  our  own  Greeks  for  loftiness  and 
refinement  of  imagination.  Both  races  are  equally  in 
earnest.  The  Greek  tells  you  that  God  is  an  accumu- 
lative Greatness,  and  he  makes  you  the  statue  of  a man 
five  times  enlarged,  as  the  Zeus  of  Phidias,  which  does 
not  frighten  you  at  all.  The  Chinese  say  that  God  is 
inimitably  vast;  that  the  vastness  bewilders  the  human 
imagination,  and  he  prepares  to  show  you  how  un- 
equipped you  for  ever  are  to  essay  the  subject.  He  con- 
ceives for  you  the  gigantic  Creator  Pwan-Ku,  with  ab- 
normal brain,  distorted  limbs,  terrifying  look  and  awful 
gesture;  or  the  leaping  war  demons.  Hung  and  Hah, 
which  hurl  thunderbolts  and  whose  eyes  burst  in  flame. 
It  would  be  hasty  to  say  that  the  Chinese  sculptor  is  ridi- 
culing God;  nothing  in  his  theology,  ethics  or  attitude 
supports  this.  He  frankly  tells  you  that  the  omnipres- 
ence of  God  which  they  express  by  the  word  Shang  Ti, 
and  the  vastness  of  God  which  they  express  by  the  word 
Tien  Chic,  can  not  be  expressed  in  sculpture,  and  in  their 
worship  can  only  be  recognized  fittingly  by  falling  before 
the  heavens  in  utter  prostration.  If  anything,  the 
Chinese  ridicules  you  that  you  should  dare  to  conceive 
what  God  is.  The  art  of  both  races  is  really  reverent, 
but  when  it  comes  to  imagination,  the  Greek  is  a tame 
multiplier  of  his  man  unit.  The  Chinese  sculptor  does 
not  attempt  to  bring  you  definiteness  or  peace  of  mind; 
he  brings  you  the  terrific,  just  as  the  thunder  brings  it  to 
a child,  and  this  is  exactly  what  his  art  intended. 

The  existence  of  Chinese  Jews  in  Kaifong,  where  the 
railway  crosses  the  Yellow  River  on  China’s  longest 


386 


THE  CHINESE 


bridge,  reveals  one  of  those  marvelous  strandings  of 
history  which  are  the  despair  of  research.  A lost  tribe 
they  certainly  are.  They  came  down  from  Kansu,  just 
as  the  original  Chinese  did,  but  how  they  reached  that 
province  in  the  first  place,  none  can  say.  They  retained 
few  rolls  of  their  Scriptures;  some  they  left  in  Turkestan 
for  mending  boots.  Their  synagogue,  or  Li  Pai  Tsz, 
has  vanished,  and  the  sect  can  only  be  traced  by  ferreting 
out  the  few  melancholy  individuals  who  will  probably 
never  be  united  again  to  unroll  the  sacred  scroll.  The 
decline  of  letters,  and  consequent  inability  to  read  and 
appreciate  their  scriptures  in  the  original,  caused  the  dis- 
banding, more  than  did  persecution  or  poverty.  What 
more  concrete  argument  was  there  ever  offered  for  the 
all-importance  of  education  ? More  melancholy  from  our 
point  of  view  was  the  wiping  out  of  the  last  of  the 
Nestorian  Christians  among  the  Chinese  by  the  sword 
of  Genghis  Khan  in  the  thirteenth  century.  Tantay,  a 
village  near  Amoy,  possesses  the  ancient  ruin  of  a Mo- 
hammedan temple  built  during  the  reign  of  the  Mings, 
when  Mohammedan  bands  wandered  freely  about  the 
empire.  The  religion  of  this  band  has  now  been  lost, 
but  the  Arab  features  are  noticeable  among  the  descend- 
ants of  a lost  tribe  of  the  Prophet’s. 


X 


japan’s  commercial  example  to  china 

The  click  of  the  trigger  in  the  “ Thousand  Islands  ” 
kingdom  has  ceased,  and  the  land  now  hums  to  the  noise 
of  the  spindle.  The  Arisaka  gun-barrel  has  been 
stacked  away,  well  oiled  for  future  use  in  Manchuria, 
Luzon  and  Australia,  and  the  stocky  Japanese  is  instead 
aiming  hammer  blows  at  rivet  heads.  A larger  in- 
dustrial host  than  England’s  is  at  work,  and  each  man  is 
half  a day  longer  on  his  “job.”  It  is  unromantic  but 
inspiring.  What  is  Japan  doing,  what  is  she  doing  it 
with,  and  what  will  the  influence  be  upon  her  neighbor 
and  pupil,  China? 

Her  wharves  are  few;  her  harbor  facilities  as  yet 
miserable.  They  will  not  always  be.  At  Kobe,  for  ex- 
ample, I found  the  sampan  journey  ashore  from  my 
steamer  a turbulent  one.  The  ship  cast  anchor  in  a 
wind-swept  roadstead,  where  lightering  is  on  some  days 
impossible.  The  godown  (warehouse)  accommodations 
are  as  much  a problem  of  congested  terminals  as  in 
American  cities.  The  government  (not  the  municipal- 
ity) is  erecting  vast  breakwaters  on  the  Onohama  side. 
The  project  of  digging  a channel  and  bringing  ships  to 
wharves  is  not  favored  in  Japan,  except  at  Kobe.  A 
ship  can  be  loaded  by  lighter- junks  from  both  sides  while 
in  the  stream.  Yokohama  is  constricted  by  a break- 
water built  too  far  up  the  bay.  The  hills  have  crowded 
around  Nagasaki’s  little  bay  until  it  is  almost  smothered. 

387 


388 


THE  CHINESE 


Fierce  tides,  like  a vengeance  for  the  Russian  fleet  sunk 
near-by,  tear  at  the  buoy  moorings  at  Shimonoseki  and 
Moji.  But  whatever  the  hindrances,  they  are  going  to 
be  overcome  by  vast  walls  of  cement,  and  the  patriotic 
government  has  made  higher  walls  of  tariffs,  so  that  the 
cement  shall  all  be  Japanese,  which  means  wealth  to  the 
cement  king  Asano,  who  owns  the  Toyo  Kisen  Kaisha 
Steamship  line  which  plies  to  San  Francisco.  It  is  Mr. 
Asano’s  plant  which  is  supplying  much  of  the  cement  for 
the  new  San  Francisco. 

Osaka  is  both  the  city  of  sculptors,  and  the  Manchester 
of  Japan.  Its  citizens  declare  it  is  destined  to  surpass 
Hong-Kong  and  Shanghai  as  the  leading  emporium  of 
the  East.  The  East  is  for  ever  hearing  the  noises  of  chal- 
lenges and  attacks  in  the  great  wars  of  the  ports.  Some 
years  ago,  twelve  million  dollars  were  appropriated  for 
dredging  in  Osaka  Bay,  and  six  thousand  ton  ships  can 
now  reach  the  once  silt-barred  port.  The  Toyo  Kisen 
Kaisha  will  soon  have  five  home-built  fourteen  thousand 
ton  ships  running.  Osaka  is  now  proposing  to  spend 
fifteen  million  more  dollars  to  bring  their  like  within 
lightering  distance  of  her  bunds,  and  the  smoke  of  a 
thousand  mills  tells  you  why.  This  is  where  labor  is 
cheapest,  and  it  is  also  the  unhealthiest  part  of  Japan. 
Japan  for  sometime  has  been  sending  from  Osaka  a 
branch  fleet  of  the  Nippon  Yusen  Kaisha  to  Bombay  for 
seven  hundred  thousand  bales  of  raw  cotton  a year,  as 
compared  with  imports  of  four  hundred  thousand  from 
America,  and  seventy  thousand  home  grown,  used  in  the 
mills.  These  mills  ordered  fifteen  million  dollars’  worth 
of  looms  and  spindles  from  the  Manchester  and  Bolton 
manufacturers.  The  Bombay  cotton  is  carried  five  thou- 
sand miles  for  three  dollars  and  twenty  cents  a ton,  which 


JAPAN  A COMMERCIAL  EXAMPLE  389 


shows  how  cheaply  the  Japanese  can  run  boats,  and  pres- 
ages, whether  we  like  it  or  not,  their  approaching  marine 
triumph  in  the  China  coastal  and  trans-Pacific  trade, 
where  the  white  man’s  unsubsidized  ships  have  to  charge 
two  and  one-half  times  greater  freight  rates  per  mile  to 
pay  expenses.  The  Japanese,  by  paying  low  salaries  to 
navigating  officers,  run  their  ships  at  fifty  per  cent,  less 
wages  (even  though  a large  part  of  the  white  man’s  crews 
on  the  Pacific  are  Mongolians),  and  still  pay  their  stock- 
holders never  less  than  twelve  per  cent.  The  largest 
steamship  company,  the  Nippon  Yusen  Kaisha,  paid  fif- 
teen per  cent,  in  1906,  and  in  the  panic  year  of  1908  it  de- 
clared twelve  per  cent.  The  standard  freight  rate  by 
American  ships  on  flour  in  quarter  sacks  across  the  Pacific 
varies  from  eight  to  five  dollars;  on  the  Japanese  lines, 
which  are  not  in  the  conference,  it  runs  from  three  dollars 
to  one  dollar  a ton,  depending  on  competition.  A ton  of 
coal  is  carried  from  Moji  to  Yokohama,  seven  hundred 
miles,  for  thirty  cents  gold,  on  Japanese  ships,  whereas  we 
would  lose  money  in  carrying  a hundred  weight  at  that 
price. 

The  British  have  complained ; later  the  Germans 
grumbled;  and  last  the  ambitious  China  Merchants’  Line 
objected,  that  the  Japanese  should  enter  the  coast  trade 
of  China.  The  Japanese  reply  was  that  they  won  the 
perpetual  right  to  the  Yellow  Sea  when  they  destroyed  in 
the  thirteenth  century  the  two  armadas  of  Kublai  Khan, 
that  famous  digger  of  the  Grand  Canal,  whose  fleets 
sailed  from  the  now  silted-up  port  of  Chin  Cheu  in 
Fu-kien.  Japan  reaches  results  rapidly  in  modern  days. 
She  took  only  ten  years  to  put  on  the  seas  the  world’s 
most  victorious  navy.  She  boasts  that  in  five  years  more 
she  will  control  the  mercantile  marine  of  the  Pacific,  and 


390 


THE  CHINESE 


in  ten  added  years,  have  purchased  and  copied  enough 
machinery  to  make  her  industrial  production  so  vast  that 
it  will  conquer  on  both  sides  of  the  Pacific.  Japanese 
commercial  flanking  movements  at  sea  have  recently  been 
as  sudden  as  those  famous  appearances  of  Kuroki  on 
land.  This  year  they  drove  the  Boston  Steamship  Com- 
pany of  America  into  liquidation.  It  paid  its  stock-hold- 
ers nothing.  There  were  three  ships  averaging  eight 
thousand  tons. 

For  a decade  the  North  German  Lloyd  have  enjoyed 
what  they  first  well  won,  the  monopoly  of  the  Bangkok- 
Swatow  service.  Japan  clapped  alongside  of  it  one 
sunrise  a competing  line,  and  a running  fight  was  made 
over  the  whole  course  and  back  again,  until  the  Lloyds 
capitulated  in  a division  of  the  service  and  concessions 
on  another  route.  The  next  to  be  attacked  were  the 
lines  long  run  by  the  ancient  and  honorable  Scotch 
houses  of  Jardine  and  Butterfield,  on  the  Yangtze,  and 
latterly  the  service  of  twenty-seven  vessels  of  the  North 
German  Lloyd  between  Shanghai  and  Tientsin.  In  the 
thick  of  the  former  fight  the  Japanese  used  methods 
which  they  declared  would  not  exactly  prove  to  be  hara- 
kiri  ones,  of  carrying  cargo  and  passengers  free  between 
Shanghai  and  Han-kau,  a distance  of  six  hundred  miles. 
Winning  a position  accordingly  in  the  center  of  China, 
they  did  one  commendable  thing  in  instituting  a new  line, 
where  even  the  Germans  did  not  think  of  going,  between 
Han-kau  and  Changsha,  through  the  famous  Tung  Ting 
Lake.  Modern  steamers,  drawing  only  four  feet,  ef- 
fectively perform  the  service.  For  the  due  upkeep  of 
this  fleet  in  the  Yangtze  region,  the  Yokohama  Dock 
Company  have  bought  certain  tsiiho  of  land  at  Shanghai 
for  a branch  dock  and  ship  repair  yard ; a double  invasion 


JAPAN  A COMMERCIAL  EXAMPLE  391 


therefore,  of  even  her  friend  Britain’s  “sacred  Yangtze 
rights.”  It  would  never  do  to  fatten  the  shares  of  the 
British-owned  local  repair  yard.  Perfide  Nippon!  the 
share-holders  of  Farnham-Boyd’s  cry.  But  why  recrim- 
inations over  so  unheroic  a matter  as  business,  the  cold 
Japanese  retort.  A few  years  ago  the  Japanese  had  not 
one  vessel  stemming  the  yellow  current  of  the  Yangtze. 
To-day  they  have  forty  steamers  on  the  river,  operated 
as  a branch  of  the  Nippon  Yusen  Kaisha,  capitalized  at 
six  millions,  and  receiving  from  the  Japanese  govern- 
ment a subsidy  of  four  hundred  thousand  dollars  gold. 
If  anything  ever  leads  to  the  annulment  of  the  Anglo- 
Japanese  alliance,  it  will  be  this  act.  Not  even  the  Holy 
Sea  of  Europe  is  sacred  from  their  attack,  for  1909  opens 
with  a Japanese  line  on  the  Mediterranean  Sea  from  Port 
Said  to  Trieste. 

A word  backward.  The  first  Japanese  steamship 
company,  the  Yubin  Jokisen  Kaisha,  founded  in  1872, 
was  naturally  a small  afifair.  The  Cunard  of  Japanese 
shipping  arose  in  1874  in  the  person  of  the  great  Samu- 
rai, Yataro  Iwasaki,  who  founded  the  more  pretentious 
Mitsui  Bishi  Kaisha.  In  ship-building  nothing  was  done 
until  the  daring  subsidy  law  of  1896  gave  birth  to  the 
great  shipyards  at  Kure,  Kobe,  Yokohama,  and  the  ba- 
ronial Mitsui  family’s  dock  at  Nagasaki,  which  are  now 
building  fourteen  thousand  ton  merchant  ships  to  join 
the  vast  steam  tonnage  of  1,200,000  tons,  accumulated 
mostly  in  tlie  last  ten  years,  which  is  a fleet  therefore 
as  imposing  as  the  world’s  largest  line,  that  of  the  Ham- 
burg .American  Line.  These  fourteen  thousand  ton 
passenger  ships,  which  are  for  the  Toyo  Kisen  Kaisha’s 
San  Francisco  run,  will  burn  oil  as  fuel,  thus  being 
the  world’s  pioneers  in  this  respect.  Twenty  million 


392 


THE  CHINESE 


barrels  of  California  oil  have  been  contracted  for,  to 
be  delivered  within  the  next  three  years.  The  oil  will 
be  refined  in  Japan  at  refineries  being  erected  at  Kobe, 
Moji  and  Yokohama.  Only  twenty  per  cent,  duty  will 
be  levied  on  crude  oil  against  forty  per  cent,  on  refined 
oil.  The  oil  will  be  carried  in  five  subsidized  tank 
steamers,  now  being  built  at  Nagasaki.  The  Toyo  Kisen 
Kaisha  will  not  carry  the  oil  in  its  mail  steamers  as  the 
heavier  traffic  on  the  Pacific  is  westbound,  and  the  space 
is  all  needed  for  merchandise.  By  touching  at  Van- 
couver with  these  eighteen  knot  ships,  the  Japanese  ex- 
pect to  bring  the  allies  at  London  and  Yokohama  within 
twenty-one  days  of  each  other. 

This  year  will  see  the  Nippon  Kisen  Kaisha  in  opera- 
tion under  the  presidency  of  Baron  (of  course  a Baron, 
for  business  is  now  a matter  of  privilege,  just  as  war 
used  to  be  in  the  feudal  days)  Shibusawa,  with  a tonnage 
of  two  hundred  thousand,  including  lines  to  Chili  for 
fertilizers;  Bombay  for  cotton;  Java  for  sugar;  Saigon 
and  Bangkok  for  rice;  Brazil  for  leather,  wool  and  que- 
bracho, and  Canada  for  flour  and  lumber.  Japan  will 
grant  a subsidy  only  to  a line  which  brings  raw  ma- 
terial. She  wants  also  to  enjoy  the  freight  on  the  manu- 
factured material,  to  be  returned  in  her  own  bottoms  to 
the  producer  of  the  raw.  When  the  St.  Paul  road 
reaches  the  Pacific,  it  will  invite  over  the  Osaka  Shosen 
Kaisha  as  its  trans-Pacific  connection. 

The  plan  is  eventually  to  buy  out  the  choicest  Ameri- 
can ships  on  the  Pacific,  and  the  Anglo- Japanese  Bank 
has  a standing  offer  to  loan  twenty  millions  at  five  per 
cent,  for  the  purpose.  This  contemplates  the  purchasing 
of  the  Pacific  Mail  and  Hill  fleets  of  eight  eight-year-old 
ships,  averaging  eighteen  knots  and  fourteen  thousand 


In  quaint  iMukden.  tlie  l)irthplace  of  the  reigning  Manchus.  I he  fa- 
mous Drum  Tower  gate,  which  sounded  tlie  alarm  when  the 
Russian  and  Japanese  armies  passed  each  twice  down  the 
wide  main  street  of  the  northern  capital  in  1904. 

Note  the  peculiar  shop  signs.  The  boy  is  carry- 
ing hair  switches,  which  are  used  to 
drive  flies  from  his  master. 


Tlie  future  Itattlegrouud  of  Chinese.  Russians  and  Japanese:  the 
country  near  Mukden,  Manchuria.  Japanese  infantry 
charging  the  Russian  trenches.  1903. 


Tile  (jreal  W all  of  China  with  ])arallel  line^  and  redoubts  cliinhmg 
the  first  range  of  hills.  J300  feet  high,  as  it  leaves  the 
sea  .at  .Shan  lltii  Kwtin,  I’echili  pro\-ince. 


JAPAN  A COMMERCIAL  EXAMPLE  393 

gross  tons.  They  expect  then  to  have  only  one  remain- 
ing battle  on  the  Pacific,  but  a hard  one  because  the  same 
weapon  will  be  used,  viz. : subsidy  against  subsidy, — in 
the  case  of  the  eight  steamers  of  the  Canadian  Pacific 
service. 

Until  recently  the  Japanese  mail  lines  to  America  and 
England  have  employed  foreign  masters,  mates  and  purs- 
ers, partly  because  white  passengers  were  thus  attracted  to 
their  boats,  and  partly  because  the  foreign  insurance 
companies  demanded  it.  But  as  Japan  has  entered  the 
insurance  field  this  has  all  been  changed  on  the  Nippon 
Yusen  Kaisha,  the  premier  line.  Captain  Yagi  now  takes 
the  fine  ship  Aki-marn,  and  Captain  Kato  the  Sado- 
maru  to  and  from  Seattle.  The  experiment  was  also 
introduced  on  the  London  line,  when  Captain  Mie  took 
out  the  lyo-maru. 

In  addition,  there  is  a modern  sail  tonnage  of  four 
hundred  thousand  tons  which  is  crowding  back  to  the 
fisheries  the  cumbersome  but  picturesque,  high-sterned 
junks.  Japan’s  modern  steam  and  sail,  and  old  style 
junk  tonnage  aggregates  2,500,000  tons. 

China  has  few  natural  harbors,  which  are  good.  They 
are  generally  where  a river  meets  the  sea,  and  her 
problems  of  siltage  are  similar  to  that  of  our  Mississippi 
at  New  Orleans.  Afforestation  at  river  sources  is  to  be 
tried.  China  has  one  great  coastal  steamship  line,  the 
China  Merchants’,  which  has  in  its  directorate  some  of 
the  Peking  official  set,  and  she  has  spasmodically  run  a 
line  financed  by  Hong-Kong  Chinese  merchants,  from 
Hong-Kong  to  San  Francisco  and  Mexico.  Foreign 
loans  and  subsidy  are  to  be  tried,  in  the  Japanese  fashion, 
to  foster  a national  mercantile  marine,  and  particularly 
to  furnish  a reserve  for  a navy.  China  has  had  for  years 


394 


THE  CHINESE 


tens  of  thousands  of  Cantonese  sailors  serving  on  foreign 
ships.  Coastal  shipping  laws  will  also  be  adopted  to 
drive  out  the  foreign  carrier,  but  Japan  will  declare  war 
on  China  over  this  venture,  if  America  does  not  befriend 
China. 

The  trouble  with  the  whole  American  subsidy  question 
is  that  the  rich  railroads  are  allowed  by  government  to 
drive  the  American  flag  off  the  seas  by  making  contracts 
with  foreign  ocean  carriers.  If  the  freight  were  in  patri- 
otism and  in  appreciation  of  the  valuable  government  pro- 
tection which  has  made  the  roads  a success,  refused  to 
foreign  owned  steamship  companies,  the  whole  com- 
plexion of  things  would  change.  The  railroads  would 
own  their  own  trans-oceanic  lines  and  see  that  they 
paid  without  anything  more  than  a just  mail  allowance. 
Extend  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Interstate  Commerce  Com- 
mission and  among  other  joys  we  shall  have  a transport 
service  always  ready  to  impress  and  save  the  nation  in 
peril,  which  was  not  the  case  when  we  fought  the  Spanish 
for  the  liberty  of  a neighbor. 

The  formidability  of  Japan’s  labor  can  be  understood 
when  it  is  stated  that  a dock  for  the  Mitsui  barons  was 
recently  cut  at  Nagasaki  out  of  the  solid  rock  large 
enough  to  put  on  the  blocks  a twenty-two  thousand  ton 
battleship.  The  cost  per  cubic  yard  for  hand-drilling, 
blasting  and  removing  was  only  fifty  cents.  The  highest 
wages  paid  to  artisans  in  the  empire  are  one  hundred  sen 
(fifty  cents  gold)  a day  given  ship-builders.  In  textile 
industries  the  maximum  rate  is  fifty  sen.  Police  receive 
eighteen  yen  (nine  dollars)  a month  and  sergeants  twen- 
ty-five yen  a month.  Into  the  world  field  of  labor  steps 
the  Chinese,  with  figures  which  beat  the  Japanese  by  one- 
third,  for  we  got  the  cost  of  labor  on  cargo  on  American 


JAPAN  A COMMERCIAL  EXAMPLE  395 


mail  ships  at  Hong-Koiig  down  to  seven  cents  a ton, 
against  twenty  cents  in  Japan  and  forty  cents  in  Amer- 
ica. 

Japan  has  conquered  the  eastern  coal  markets  with 
exports  of  six  million  tons  a year,  laying  down  coals  as  far 
south  as  Singapore  for  three  dollars  and  a quarter, 
against  the  cost  for  English  and  Australian  coals  of  five 
dollars.  The  famous  oily  coals  all  come  from  Kyushu, 
the  southern  island,  and  much  of  the  mining  is  done  un- 
der the  sea,  American  electric  turbines  providing  the 
power.  The  northern  island,  Ezo,  also  produces  bitu- 
minous, but  of  a harder  quality,  known  as  Muroran. 
Japan  mined  fifteen  million  tons  last  year,  and  produced 
eighty  million  gallons  of  petroleum.  As  a gift  of  the 
war,  she  will  now  develop  the  product  of  the  famous  En- 
tai  mines  of  anthracite  in  Manchuria,  which  come  in  good 
stead,  for  Chinese  anthracite  coal  has  been  costing  ten 
dollars  a ton  at  Newchwang  on  account  of  the  ex- 
pense of  transport.  Machinery,  a mining  policy  on  the 
part  of  a progressing  government,  the  abolition  by  edict 
of  the  Fungshui  superstition,  and  branch  railways,  will 
before  long  uncover  much  of  China’s  vast  wealth  in  coal, 
and  her  undeveloped  deposits  are  the  richest  in  the  world. 
With  hampered  facilities  and  disconnected  transit  she 
now  mines  half  what  Japan  does.  We  are  now  begin- 
ning to  notice  Chinese  coal  offered  in  competition  with 
the  foreign  article  at  Canton,  Han-kau  and  Tientsin. 
The  successful  cotton  and  iron  mills  erected  by  Viceroy 
Chang  in  the  middle  provinces  burn  native  coal. 

The  little  empire  of  Nippon,  which  is  smaller  than 
Scotland,  and  supports  far  more  people  than  the  British 
Isles,  perforce  uses  many  unique  footholds.  Swamps, 
which  are  too  poor  to  raise  rice,  are  put  under  toll  to  pro- 


396 


THE  CHINESE 


duce  the  matting  rush.  In  one  prefecture,  Okayama, 
which  faces  the  Inland  Sea,  four  hundred  thousand  rolls 
a year,  worth  over  a million  of  dollars,  are  woven  for  ex- 
port. These  old  industries,  with  a lingering  sentiment, 
are  yet  retained  to  the  clans,  which  have  immemorially 
worked  them. 

China’s  largest  matting  swamps  lie  off  the  romantic 
West  River,  near  Canton.  German  middlemen  control 
the  product,  which  moves  in  the  fall.  Only  the  cheapest 
labor  and  steamship  rates  make  possible  the  export  of  the 
product,  which  will  probably  rise  in  price,  following  Ja- 
pan’s example.  The  Chinese  matting  is  superior  in 
strength  but  inferior  in  design,  as  compared  with  the  Jap- 
anese matting. 

Here  is  the  reverse  of  the  shield.  In  many  instances 
it  was  humorous,  yet  it  was  mendacious.  I found  large 
numbers  of  our  copyright  labels  pirated  on  Japanese  in- 
ferior canned  and  bottled  goods,  offered  throughout  Ja- 
pan, Korea  and  Manchuria,  despite  all  international 
agreements  and  conventions.  A shameful  authority  until 
recently  for  national  theft  was  Article  Two  of  the  Japa- 
nese patent  law,  by  which  if  the  Japanese  Patent  Bureau 
published  the  description  of  any  foreign  invention  it  be- 
came Japanese  public  property  and  could  not  be  patented 
by  the  foreign  owner.  In  this  way  Japan  has  stolen  ten 
thousand  foreign  inventions  for  the  benefit  of  her  people, 
and  she  has  given  exclusive  right  to  Japanese  firms  and 
individuals  to  collect  royalty  on  six  thousand  additional 
foreign  patents.  When  the  Israelites  left  Egypt  with 
the  borrowed  valuables  of  their  taskmasters,  their  thefts 
did  not  at  all  equal  the  debts  their  enslavers  owed  them, 
and  therefore  the  unbecoming  spectacle  was  not  an  alto- 
gether reprehensible  embezzlement  from  the  view-point 


JAPAN  A COMMERCIAL  EXAMPLE  397 

of  equity.  The  Patent  Bureau  of  Japan  has  neither  Isis 
or  Moses,  and  only  the  frenzied  god  of  Ambition  on  its 
dishonored  shrine,  and  the  Samurai  must  eventually  come 
forward  and  do  some  shop-cleaning  for  his  weaker  com- 
mercial brother,  if  Japanese  progress  is  to  be  permanent 
and  live  in  the  smile  of  the  nations.  Japan  can  not  too 
earnestly  consider  history’s  eternal  lesson  that  moral 
strength  is  prerequisite  to  armaments  in  conquests  of  her- 
self and  her  enemies. 

The  editor  of  the  Tokio  Nichi  introduced  a bill  in  a re- 
cent session  of  the  Diet  to  prevent  newspapers  copying 
telegrams  without  the  consent  of  the  paper  which  had  paid 
for  the  telegram,  but  the  House  of  Representatives,  on 
the  suggestion  of  Mr.  O.  Oka,  editor  of  the  Tokio  Shim- 
bun,  threw  out  the  bill,  so  that  if  the  Japanese  steal  pat- 
ents from  the  world,  they  are  also  pirates  of  copyright 
and  Press  Agency  right  among  themselves.  It  is  risky 
to  lend  an  ambitious  Japanese  student  your  book;  he  will 
translate  it ; he  will  have  it  published  in  his  name,  leaving 
yours  oflf,  of  course,  and  immediately  his  fame  as  a 
scholar  is  enhanced  in  the  eyes  of  his  ducal  patron.  If 
you  expostulate,  he  asks  if  he  is  not  the  author  of  the 
Japanese  version,  and  offers  you  a glorious  dinner  at  the 
tea-house  when  he  receives  an  appointment  in  the  Civil 
Service  as  the  protege  of  the  said  duke,  who  also  has  his 
reasons  for  affecting  literature.  The  Japanese  apologists 
are  sufficiently  patriotic  to  be  blind  to  every  national  criti- 
cism, but  they  are  lavish  enough  in  reviling  their  betters 
in  the  homely  virtues,  who  dwell  across  the  yellow  water. 
To  quote  the  smart  Mabuchi,  as  far  back  as  the  seven- 
teenth century : “ The  Chinese,  bad  at  heart,  are  good 

only  on  the  outside.  The  Japanese  being  straightforward 
can  do  without  moral  teaching;  the  Chinese  have  theoreti- 


398 


THE  CHINESE 


cal  morals;  the  Japanese  have  practical,  up-to-date 
morals.” 

Comparison  in  the  case  of  China  is  comforting,  for 
China  protects  foreign  patents. 

Japan  was  winning  some  wonderful  commercial  vic- 
tories years  before  she  sighted  her  arms  for  war.  She 
was  and  is  selling  America  twice  what  she  buys  from 
America,  which  is  probably  the  most  significant  achieve- 
ment of  the  island  kingdom  to  date.  Every  Japanese 
propogandist  who  is  trained  to  write  articles  for  the 
American  press,  purposely  ignores  this  fact.  Until  1905 
America  was  Japan’s  best  customer,  but  now  she  sells 
China  more  than  she  does  America,  w'hich  is  distinctly  in 
line  with  her  ambition.  Immediately  after  the  war 
closed,  her  imports  decreased  five  million  dollars  a month, 
and  her  exports  increased  by  the  same  amount,  all  be- 
cause the  soldiers  of  Oyama  went  back  to  the  silk  and 
cotton  looms,  the  porcelain  kilns  and  the  matting  sheds, 
which  they  had  deserted  for  a while. 

As  eastbound  freight  is  the  lesser,  it  will  not  be  sur- 
prising if  timber  from  the  war- won  Yalu  is  freighted  in 
larger  quantities  by  the  Japanese  steamers  to  the  Pacific 
coast  of  America.  They  have  formed  the  Japan-China 
Timber  Company,  and  expect  to  cut  three  hundred  rafts 
a year  at  a profit  of  six  hundred  thousand  dollars.  Al- 
ready they  are  laying  down  at  Guaymas,  Mexico,  two  mil- 
lion ties  from  Manchuria  at  fifty-six  cents  gold  each. 
These  virgin  forests  have  never  before  been  desecrated 
with  saw  or  ax.  The  Japanese  railways  buy  their  chest- 
nut (kuri)  ties  for  twenty-five  cents  gold  each,  which 
shows  the  latent  resources  and  the  economy  of  produc- 
tion of  the  wonderful  little  kingdom.  Japan’s  lum- 
ber is  produced  mainly  on  volcanic  Ezo  Island  in  the 


JAPAN  A COMMERCIAL  EXAMPLE  399 

far  north.  The  foot-hills  have  been  enriched  with  an 
ashy  and  charred  deposit  over  the  marshes.  On  this  soil 
kashkva  (oak)  senn  (elm)  and  ash  grow  to  a sturdy 
girth,  but  not  to  a great  height.  The  lumber  is  faulty 
and  twisty.  In  the  great  heat  of  the  summers  an  under- 
growth of  bamboo  grass,  ten  feet  high,  springs  up.  Win- 
ter is  severe  during  three  months.  The  stream  courses 
are  precipitate,  and  the  whole  country  is  cut  into  canyons 
and  fissures,  which  make  logging  difficult,  but  the  inde- 
fatigable workers  overcome  everything  and  produce  at 
the  low  cost  already  detailed.  Every  sprig  of  wood  is 
used  as  carefully  as  in  France  or  Palestine.  The  waste 
is  burned  into  charcoal,  if  nothing  else.  Every  living 
Japanese,  male,  female  and  child,  I think,  smokes  ciga- 
rettes, and  the  cost  in  forest  fires  is  something  deplora- 
ble, which  the  little  country  can  not  and  will  not  long 
afford.  Her  forest  policy  will  add  a total  abstinence  ad- 
junct. Not  only  into  lumber  exporting,  but  furniture 
making,  Japan  is  going,  and  she  has  a fashion  of  lifting 
her  goods  into  any  country  where  the  tariff  wall  is  not 
too  high  for  such  little  brown  men.  Pitiable,  deforested 
China  possesses  no  timber,  except  in  Manchuria,  and  Ja- 
pan will  block  the  export  of  lumber  from  that  province 
to  the  sea  via  the  South  Manchuria  Railway  until  the  Chi- 
nese, overcoming  the  vast  diplomatic  difficulties  which 
have  been  raised  recently  against  them,  parallel  that  line 
to  Newchwang.  The  rival  yellow  men  are  now  at 
swords’  points  over  this  development,  and  you  can  put  it 
down  as  the  cause  of  two  future  wars. 

Seven  years  before  the  Japan-Russia  war  Japan  un- 
folded her  serious  designs  upon  China  by  soliciting  ten 
thousand  Chinese  students  to  come  to  Japan.  Thirty 
thousand  are  this  day  in  Japan.  Of  course  no  other 


400 


THE  CHINESE 


country  can  now  hope  to  equal  Japan’s  predominant  in- 
fluence, evidenced  for  one  thing  in  the  overthrow  of 
China’s  most  ancient  institution,  her  Classical  Examina- 
tions. It  would  pay  the  four  white  nations  chiefly  con- 
cerned to  set  apart  five  million  dollars  a year  to  secure 
Chinese  students  for  our  schools,  shops  and  universities. 
No  other  commercial  plan  can  be  so  effective,  for  the  stu- 
dents are  in  the  fore  of  the  New  China  already.  Particu- 
larly should  Chinese  from  the  southern  provinces  be  solic- 
ited, and  not  Manchus,  for  the  Manchu  is  only  one-twen- 
tieth of  the  population,  and  he  will  in  the  end  only  bend 
to  the  opinions  of  the  majority.  The  Japan-China  trade, 
largely  as  a result  of  this  educational  policy,  has  devel- 
oped wonderfully  in  the  last  few  years.  In  1903  the  im- 
ports and  exports  of  the  two  countries  amounted  to  twelve 
million  yen  only.  In  1905  the  total  had  risen  to  fifty-two 
million  yen,  and  this  year  it  was  eighty  million  yen.  This 
year  Japan  sent  to  China  for  twenty  million  yen  of  raw 
material,  and  returned  the  goods  in  manufactured  form, 
charging  China  forty-five  million  yen.  Until  1897  the 
smooth  bores  glistening  from  armored  sides  compelled 
Japan  to  admit  the  manufactures  of  the  nations  at  a duty 
of  not  more  than  five  per  cent,  ad  valorem.  The  China 
war  showed  the  nations  what  Japan  could  do,  and  the  five 
per  cent,  condition  was  annulled.  The  real  victory  of  the 
Russian  war  is  a more  extended  one,  in  that  the  nations 
now  consent  that  Japan  may  raise  her  ad  valorem  duties 
to  fifty  per  cent,  unless  a quid  pro  quo  is  given.  Statistics 
of  the  peace  years  demonstrate  two  things,  that  a smaller 
number  of  Occidentals  visit  Japan  than  one  would  sup- 
pose, and  that  Japan  is  becoming  the  Mecca  for  Orientals 
in  increasing  numbers,  who,  marvelous  to  say,  leave  in  the 
country  half  as  much  per  capita  as  does  the  Occidental. 
Here  are  the  figures  of  tourist  arrivals : 


JAPAN  A COMMERCIAL  EXAMPLE  401 


ORIENTALS 

OCCIDENTALS 

1902 

••  4.950 

8,759 

1903 

. . 6,418  

1905 

••  9,237  

7,293 

1906 

. . 12,500 

1907 

. . 20,000  

1908 

. . 40,000 

Of  the  Occidentals,  Russians  predominate,  with  Ameri- 
cans and  British  following  in  order. 

Cheap  labor  is  Japan’s  greatest  industrial  asset. 
Japanese  industry,  in  order  to  overwhelm  competition,  has 
adopted  a new  slavery,  that  of  long  hours  for  operatives. 
Mill  hands  work  from  daylight  till  dark,  or  thirteen  hours, 
for  forty  sen  (twenty  cents  gold)  a day.  The  departure 
of  tillers  from  the  field  to  factory  and  mine  has  increased 
the  cost  of  living  seventy  per  cent,  against  a wage  increase 
of  forty  per  cent.  The  enormous  reserve  which  this 
people  can  discover  is  illustrated  by  the  work,  mainly  per- 
formed by  women  during  the  war.  Seventy  per  cent,  of 
the  war  necessities  was  produced  within  the  empire  itself. 
When  Britain,  a similar  island  manufacturing  nation, 
fought  in  Africa,  only  forty  per  cent,  of  the  war’s  necessi- 
ties was  produced  at  home.  That  taxes  are  not  to  be 
lowered,  can  be  judged  from  the  figure  in  Prince  Ito’s 
(by  the  way,  a common  name  in  Japan)  speech,  in  which 
he  said : “No  Daruma,  with  his  fairy  gold-producing 

hammer,  is  likely  to  appear  in  Japan;  there  is  nothing 
for  it  but  our  own  diligence.  If  others  do  not  drown 
who  are  lower  down  than  we,  you  may  be  sure  we  are 
still  swimming.”  How  he  loves  to  rap  China’s  “ sub- 
merged civilization,”  and  how  China  hates  him  for  it, 
just  as  the  Koreans  do ! 

You  will  be  struck  by  the  dangerous  width  of  the  cars 
which  run  over  the  main  lines  of  three  feet  six  inches 


402 


THE  CHINESE 


gage.  On  this  account  the  fastest  expresses  do  not 
make  over  forty  miles  an  hour.  The  railways  carried 
one  hundred  and  forty  million  passengers  last  year,  with 
only  thirty  deaths.  The  government  had  to  take  over 
the  railways,  as  only  government  credit  in  such  a coun- 
try could  standardize  gage  through  the  numberless  tun- 
nels, culverts,  bridges  and  grades  of  this  difficult  coun- 
try, where  nature  has  tried  to  delay  the  feet  of  beauty, 
and  not  to  speed  the  car  of  commerce.  As  in  China,  so  in 
Japan  the  merchants  club  together  to  secure  carload  rates, 
the  ratio  of  this  “ consolidated  ” traffic  assuming  the  very 
large  proportion  of  eighty-six  out  of  one  hundred  tons 
shipped.  Ninety-five  per  cent,  of  the  passengers  travel 
third  class,  and  only  five-sixteenths  of  one  per  cent,  travel 
first  class.  The  average  train  load  is  sixty-three  passen- 
gers, and  length  of  journey  twenty  miles.  How  opposite 
is  the  tale,  and  the  luxurious  habits  it  reveals,  in  Amer- 
ica ! The  average  freight  train  load  is  three  hundred  and 
eight  tons,  and  average  haul  sixty-one  miles.  Gross 
earnings  averaged  sixty-two  hundred  dollars  a mile,  fifty- 
five  per  cent,  of  this  being  applicable  to  net  earnings.  The 
average  monthly  compensation  for  all  railway  employees 
is  seven  dollars  and  a half,  against  forty  in  America. 
Engineers  get  forty  cents  a day. 

China  is  entering  upon  a railway  policy  under  better 
auspices,  and  with  less  physical  obstruction  than  Japan, 
and  the  result  will  accordingly  be  more  gratifying  in  all 
directions.  Already  the  Chinese  mileage  is  greater,  and 
is  rapidly  increasing. 

That  commerce  in  America  and  Japan  is  respectively 
on  a peace  and  war  basis  could  not  be  better  illustrated 
than  by  the  railway  policy.  Government  control  of  rail- 
ways in  America  so  far  is  only  desired  in  respect  of 


■ Double-truck  Rullways  In  operation.  1909  .!■■■■  Slng/e-track  Rallivays  In  operation,  1909  Railway  Concessions  In  effect  in  1909 

NORTHP  A<;TPWM  CMTM  a 


JAPAN  A COMMERCIAL  EXAMPLE  403 


rates.  Japanese  control  was  primarily  desired  in  respect 
of  operation.  It  was  found  that  the  operation  of  the  Jap- 
anese railways  during  the  war  was  not  satisfactory  for 
the  movement  of  troops,  and  nothing  to  compare  with  the 
wonderful  work  which  the  Siberian  Railway  performed 
in  carrying  and  feeding  nine  hundred  thousand  troops, 
five  thousand  and  five  hundred  miles  from  their  base. 
Russia  won  only  one  victory,  but  that  was  a signal  one, 
and  a monument  to  America’s  pupil.  Prince  Khilkoff,  the 
maker  of  the  Trans-Siberian  Railway.  On  a single  track 
line,  with  rails  only  forty  pounds  per  yard,  twenty  trains 
at  a speed  of  sixteen  miles  an  hour  were  passed  in  the 
twenty-four  hours.  Compare  this  with  the  best  perform- 
ance in  India  of  thirteen  trains  daily.  Japan  has  not  been 
slow  to  admire  and  follow.  The  first  125,000,000  yen 
have  been  transferred  for  the  purchase  of  all  roads  au- 
thorized by  both  houses  of  the  Diet  in  March  1906,  and 
the  following  roads  have  already  entered  government  op- 
eration: The  scenic  Sanyo  from  Kobe  to  Shimonoseki; 

the  Kokkaido;  Tanko;  Kobu;  Nippon;  Ganyetsu,  and 
Nishinari  “ Tetsudos,”  or  railways.  Under  the  new 
Japanese  tariff,  Germany  now  supplies  the  largest  amount 
of  locomotives  and  Britain  the  largest  amount  of  cars  to 
Japan.  Considering  the  money  America  loaned  Japan 
during  the  war,  she  should  be  in  second  instead  of  third 
place.  When  the  contracts  were  made  our  navy  was  at 
home. 

Weight  is  computed  by  the  Kin  (one  and  one-third 
pounds),  and  Kwamme  (eight  and  one-fourth  pounds) ; 
measure  by  the  Go  (pint),  To  (one-half  bushel),  and 
Koku  (five  bushels) ; and  for  precious  metals  the  Momme 
equals  our  fifty-eight  grains  troy.  Land  is  surveyed  by 
the  Tan  (one  thousand  and  eight  hundred  square  feet). 


404 


THE  CHINESE 


and  Cho  (nine  thousand  square  yards).  China  was  not 
behind  in  an  irregular  system  of  weights  and  measures, 
understood  differently  in  the  various  provinces,  until  the 
Peking  Board  of  Revenue  recently  advised  a decimal  sys- 
tem, the  unit  of  length,  Tchi,  being  equivalent  to  thirty- 
two  centimeters;  unit  of  capacity.  To,  equivalent  to  10.35 
liters;  the  unit  of  weight,  Lian,  equivalent  to  37.30  grams. 
It  will  take  some  time  before  the  people  are  taught  the 
new  system. 

The  mortgaging  of  real  estate  in  Japan  was  only  per- 
mitted as  late  as  1906,  and  brought  into  the  country  forty 
million  foreign  dollars  each  year  since,  which  has  been 
immediately  put  into  mines  and  manufacturing.  The 
Japanese  government  is  encouraging  the  investment  of 
Lancashire  capital  on  long  leases  (the  same  as  the  Hong- 
Kong  crown  leases)  in  the  cotton-mills  of  Osaka,  just  as 
Dundee  capital  went  to  India  and  developed  the  jute  fac- 
tories. Prior  to  the  passage  of  the  real  estate  law,  manu- 
factories paid  as  high  as  nine  per  cent,  for  their  loans. 
China  is  yet  behind  in  the  security  she  gives  the  foreign 
investor.  Therefore  the  viceroys  borrow  on  provincial 
account,  with  taxes  as  security,  and  like  Chang  of  Han- 
kau  erect  their  own  provincial  cotton,  iron  and  coal 
plants. 

As  might  be  expected  in  so  volcanic  a country,  where 
there  are  fifty-four  active  and  one  hundred  and  ten  ex- 
tinct volcanoes,  sulphur  is  largely  produced  in  Japan, 
generally  as  in  Sicily,  in  the  district  of  the  active  vol- 
canoes. Fifteen  thousand  tons  a year  are  exported  from 
Hakodate.  These  Ezo  mines  are  owned  by  the  ducal 
Mitsui  family.  Work  is  interrupted  for  five  months  by 
snow.  Japan  was  thus  happily  in  a position  to  produce 
her  famous  Shimoso  explosive  for  the  “ Great  War,”  as 


JAPAN  A COMMERCIAL  EXAMPLE  405 


they  call  it,  and  naturally  her  matches  (a  government 
monopoly)  are  all-conquering  in  China  and  the  far 
East.  They  affect  the  use  of  a gloomy-colored  box  pat- 
terned after  the  Swedish.  The  superior  richness  of  the 
Japanese  ore  can  be  judged  by  comparison  with  the  ore 
of  Sicily,  the  figures  being  fifty  per  cent,  against  twenty 
per  cent.  The  yearly  output  of  sulphur  is  seventy  mil- 
lion pounds.  Salt  and  tobacco  manufacture  are  also  gov- 
ernment monopolies,  so  that  Japanese  conservatives  are 
not  eloquent  on  Trust-smashing.  China  follows  suit  in 
the  respect  of  making  salt  a government  monopoly,  but 
she  knows  her  people  will  not  stand  for  much  repetition 
of  this  system. 

In  Formosa  Japan  is  eagerly  developing  gold  mining 
at  an  increase  of  about  twenty  per  cent,  each  year.  In 
1908  one  and  one-half  millions  of  bullion  were  produced 
at  the  Kyufun,  Kinkwaseki  and  Botanko  mines.  There 
are  even  successful  placer  workings  at  this  late  date.  Sul- 
phur, coal  and  petroleum  mines  are  now  being  developed 
near  Kilung  in  Formosa.  Since  Japan  has  shorn  China 
of  Formosa,  China’s  old  port  of  Amoy,  which  once  con- 
trolled Formosan  trade,  has  fallen  into  bitter  desuetude. 
Put  it  down,  too,  in  these  days  of  awakening  national 
conscience  and  restitutions,  that  China  must  have  For- 
mosa back,  of  course  paying  Japan  the  tutor  bill. 

When  the  silver  above  the  line  of  oxidation  worked 
out  in  the  Kosaka  mine  in  the  north  of  Nippon  Island, 
copper  was  discovered,  and  seven  thousand  and  five  hun- 
dred tons  are  produced  yearly.  The  ancient  Ashio  mine, 
in  a hill  near  the  sacred  temple  town  of  Nikko,  turns  out 
like  clock-work,  with  its  eight  thousand  employees,  seven 
thousand  tons  yearly,  and  the  Besshi  mine  adds  another 
six  thousand  tons.  So  Japan  takes  pretty  good  care  of 


4o6 


THE  CHINESE 


herself  in  this  other  war  and  electrical  requisite.  Before 
the  Great  War  the  steel  industry  was  in  a languishing 
condition,  not  twenty  thousand  tons  a year  being  pro- 
duced. The  war  changed  things,  the  Government  put- 
ting $12,000,000  into  the  furnaces  at  Wakamatsu,  near 
Inaka  Lake,  in  the  north  of  Nippon.  Note  that  it  is  the 
government  initiative  in  all  this  progress.  The  works 
there,  and  new  works  at  Aluroran,  in  Ezo  Island,  are 
turning  out  one  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  tons  a year, 
and  in  two  years  the  government  expects  to  meet  one- 
eighth  of  the  requirements  of  the  country,  which  are 
about  eight  hundred  thousand  tons  a year.  At  present 
Japan  is  drawing  pig-ore  from  Han-kau,  China,  where 
most  of  Japan’s  supply  will  come  from  in  future. 
Speaking  generally  of  copper,  silver  and  gold  mines  in 
Japan  proper,  the  ore  is  of  low  grade,  but  great  profits  are 
made  because  every  member  of  the  family  works  at  the 
lowest  wages.  There  is  also  little  expense  for  pumping, 
as  the  drifts  are  cut  horizontally  into  the  hills.  The 
finest  machinery  and  complete  electric  plants  minimize  the 
cost  of  operation.  Last  year  Japan  proper  produced 
seven  thousand  and  five  hundred  pounds  of  gold,  and 
two  hundred  thousand  pounds  of  silver.  Japanese  gal- 
leries are  protected  less  carefully  than  in  America,  and 
the  proportion  of  deaths  is  therefore  heavier.  The  health 
and  education  of  operatives  are  sacrificed  to  production, 
and  Japan  has  many  an  uncomfortable  sociological  prob- 
lem on  her  hands. 

Let  us  take  a glance  at  “ Outer  Japan,”  for  so  we  must 
learn  to  call  it.  She  is  finding  it  hard  as  flint  to  con- 
quer the  spirits  of  the  sulky  Koreans  in  their  stream- 
webbed  land  of  the  “ Adorning  Calm,”  who  want  neither 
to  rule  themselves  in  a modern  sense,  nor  to  be  ruled. 


JAPAN  A COMMERCIAL  EXAMPLE  407 


Their  emblem,  the  Tageuk  — two  comets  involved  and 
for  ever  impeding  each  other  — is  a sign  not  without  sig- 
nificance. The  Japanese  affront  their  pride  on  every 
occasion.  For  instance,  they  have  turned  over  an  import- 
ant precedent  in  compelling  political  prisoners  to  submit 
to  their  hair  being  cut  off.  The  Japanese  intend  that  the 
Koreans  shall  remain  a subject  and  dying  race  and  not  be 
absorbed,  the  government  having  prohibited  the  Japanese 
colonists  to  intermarry  with  the  natives.  Japanese  states- 
men are  emphatic  that  Lincoln  made  a mistake  in  giving 
the  negroes  equality  with  the  whites.  This  unmistakably 
shows  how  they  mean  to  rule  in  Korea,  and  the  trend  of 
their  influence  in  Manchuria  (and  in  China  when  they 
arrive) ! The  conceit  of  it,  you  say.  In  her  new  era 
of  colonization  Japan  means  to  follow  Roman  more  than 
British  methods.  Simple  Korea  of  the  past!  In  the 
style  of  his  home,  the  Korean  exhibits  his  exclusiveness, 
each  house  being  entirely  surrounded  with  the  servants’ 
compound.  It  is  a green  and  white  land,  the  houses  and 
garments  being  the  latter  color.  The  valuable  gold  bod- 
ies belonged  to  the  Imperial  household.  They  have  been 
confiscated  for  the  benefit  of  Japanese  baronial  houses, 
or  “ Titled  Trusts.”  The  Japanese  have  completed  the 
railroads  running  the  length  of  the  peninsula  five  hundred 
and  fifty  miles,  and  also  across  the  country  from  Seoul  to 
Gensan,  one  hundred  and  sixty  miles,  according  to  pro- 
gram laid  out  five  years  ago.  They  will  be  operated  by 
the  government,  which  also  retains  the  coal  deposits,  to 
work  chiefly  as  a war  reserve.  In  a word,  the  peninsula 
is  to  be  a repetition  of  Egyptian  occupation,  but  the 
Kohim  Hoi  (Society  of  Daily  Progress)  declares  the  Jap- 
anese will  not  find  the  Korean  as  docile  and  extingnish- 
able  as  the  Fellahin.  For  the  East,  the  sickly  East,  the 


4o8 


THE  CHINESE 


climate  is  a joy.  The  summer  rains  are  somewhat  heavy. 
The  winters  are  of  the  Canadian  type,  dry  and  bracing. 
Spring  and  autumn  are  as  green  and  gold  as  the  maple 
leaf.  China  of  course  sympathizes  with  the  Koreans  in 
what  appears  to  be  their  commercial  and  national  ex- 
tinction. 

While  the  sovereignty  of  China  in  Manchuria,  which 
the  Committee  of  white  Shanghai  merchants  called  a 
“ second  Manitoba,”  is  reiterated  by  the  Japanese  well 
organized  press  agency,  and  the  irregular  “ American 
agreement,”  you  hear  little  of  it  along  the  wonderful  val- 
ley of  the  Liau  Ho,  which  the  Chinese  call  their  “ Thou- 
sand Mile  View.”  Baron  Saionji  has  formed  a trust, 
called  the  Minami  Manshu,  with  $75,000,000  capital,  re- 
stricted to  a Japanese  majority  subscription,  for  the  de- 
velopment of  the  deposits  of  five  hundred  million  tons  of 
coal  in  the  Mu  Tsi  district,  and  connecting  them  by 
branch  railways  with  the  old  parent  line  to  Port  Arthur. 
The  scheme  is  a Manchurian  Development  Company  with 
a very  broad  charter  and  comprehensive  aims  under  dis- 
tinct Government  patronage.  On  the  railway  which  the 
war  gave  her  in  Southern  Manchuria,  Japan  is  seeking 
a loan  of  $150,000,000,  which  will  be  reloaned  to  finance 
these  Government-Baronial  Development  Companies. 
The  railway  is  to  be  broad-gaged  so  as  to  exchange  traf- 
fic with  the  Chinese  railways  coming  from  the  south  and 
west,  rather  than  to  look  for  trade  with  the  broader 
gaged  Siberian  Railway  at  Kwang  Chau  Fu.  Ex- 
clusive of  the  revenue  from  military  transport  the  South 
Manchuria  Railway  is  already  earning  $3,000,000  gold  a 
year,  or  nineteen  dollars  gold  a mile  per  day.  The  oper- 
ating expenses  are  forty-five  per  cent.  China  is  fighting 
Japan  bitterly  to  parallel  with  the  Fakumen  Railway  the 


JAPAN  A COMMERCIAL  EXAMPLE  409 

Japanese  South  Manchurian  Railway  from  the  Russian 
railways  down  past  Mukden  to  tidewater  in  Liaotung 
Gulf.  China,  with  America’s  support,  can  on  this  ques- 
tion eventually  force  Britain  to  aid  China  and  break  the 
unholy  alliance  with  Japan.  The  Yokohama  Specie  Bank 
is  intrenched  through  government  assistance,  though  the 
Chinese  take  their  notes  at  four  per  cent,  less  than  the 
Mexican  silver  dollar,  which  they  are  used  to.  An  odd 
feature  of  the  wharves  of  Newchwang  are  the  piles  of 
Japanese  and  Russian  shell  fragments,  which  have  been 
gathered  from  the  battlefields  by  the  indefatigable  Chinese 
and  brought  down  the  Liao  in  junks.  What  would  we 
think  if  similar  hands  had  commercialized  the  glory  of 
Plevna,  Metz,  Vicksburg  or  Alexandria?  But  the  Chi- 
nese have  never  thought  war  was  glory. 

Another  knotty  problem  for  the  future  in  Manchuria 
is  the  question  of  taxation  in  the  railroad  zone.  The 
Russians  control  the  largest  part  of  the  Chinese  Eastern 
Railway.  The  Japanese  own  as  a war  legacy  the  South 
Manchurian  Railway.  Now,  if  the  Americans,  British 
and  French  have  a right  to  levy  taxes  in  the  settlements 
of  Shanghai,  Tientsin,  etc.,  why  have  not  the  Russians 
and  Japanese  the  same  right  in  the  railroad  zones  in  Man- 
churia? The  foreign  occupation  of  the  ports  is  ancient 
history  and  does  not  cut  a province  in  two.  Again,  if  the 
Russians  and  Japanese  have  the  taxation  right,  when  will 
they  ever  concede  China’s  ancient  right  to  Manchurian 
sovereignty?  I recommend  that  the  Manchurian  ques- 
tion be  treated  solus,  and  that  Russia  and  Japan  have  a 
limited  police  privilege  per  mile,  but  not  the  tax  right 
within  the  zones,  and  that  otherwise  there  be  sincere  evac- 
uation of  the  province  by  the  Russian  and  Japanese 
arms.  At  present,  the  Russians  admit  Chinese  sover- 


410 


THE  CHINESE 


eignty,  and  the  right  to  divide  the  taxes  within  the  rail- 
way zone,  and  the  Russians  still  keep  the  wedge  in  by 
holding  a municipal  district  at  Harbin,  all  of  which  will 
encourage  Japan  to  invent  similar  claims  in  South  !Man- 
churia,  to  the  distress  of  other  foreigners  and  of  China. 

The  Japanese  cotton  merchants  of  Osaka,  who  are 
driving  America’s  cotton  trade  from  Manchuria,  also 
despite  the  “ American  agreement,”  have  organized  into 
a guild,  and  appointed  the  baronial  house  of  Mitsui  as 
Manchurian  Agents.  The  latter  have  obtained  from  the 
government  an  advance  of  6,000,000  yen  at  four  per 
cent,  and  the  merchants  are  extended  this  rate  for  four 
months  upon  their  shipping  bills.  There  is  no  wonder 
therefore  that  America’s  cotton  trade  with  Manchuria  of 
four  million  taels  a year  should  be  throttled,  and  although 
Japanese  consuls  disguise  it,  Japan’s  entire  business  (rail- 
way, export  and  manufacturing)  is  becoming  national- 
ized into  the  largest  aggregation  of  baronial-government 
trusts  which  commerce  has  ever  experienced.  To  speak 
the  clear  truth,  there  are  very  few  privileges  granted  in 
Japan  unless  the  southern  Satsuma  and  Cho  Shin  baron- 
ial families,  who  placed  the  priest-Emperor  over  the 
political-Shoguns,  are  first  asked  what  they  want  — the 
former  in  navy  affairs  and  the  latter  in  army  and  com- 
merce. The  members  of  the  Imperial  family  are  heavy 
stock-holders  in  the  largest  Japanese  steamship  company. 
The  baronial  or  daimio  families  number  two  hundred  and 
fifty.  Japan  owes  half  a billion  to  America  and  Britain; 
she  borrowed  as  much  from  her  own  people.  Her  rail- 
ways cost  her  $200,000,000.  Cotton,  tobacco,  matches 
and  other  monopolies  cost  the  government  another  $100,- 
000,000.  So  it  can  easily  be  figured  what  the  government 
has  to  earn  to  live.  When  their  jingo  “ Progressives  ” 


Monster  statues  along  the  avenue  to  the  Ming  tomlis.  near  Peking, 
date  1330  A.D.  The  rocks  on  the  elephant  statues 
have  been  thrown  there  by  irreverent  tourists 
who  were  not  of  Oriental  blood. 


Monster  statues  on  the  road  to  the  tombs  of  the  Ming  dynasty,  near 
Peking.  Date  1330  A.D.  The  sheep  of  North  China 
furnish  the  largest  part  of  America's  wool  supply. 


UHOtowooe  « v«>oi«»ooe,  n v. 


A pro])hecy  in  fertile  Manchuria,  the  future  granary  of  China,  jai)an 
and  the  Western  United  States:  an  .American  cavalry  horse 
discarded  at  the  Peking  siege;  a Chinese  waterhut'falo : 
a Mongol  burro  and  a Mancbu  pony,  all  hitched 
to  a draft  vehicle  which  carries  im- 
ported .American  cotton. 


JAPAN  A COMMERCIAL  EXAMPLE  41 1 

froth,  many  among  us  arc  beginning  to  cogitate  that,  as  in 
tlie  case  of  the  head  of  the  Musselmen,  the  only  way  to 
keep  Japan  from  marching  upon  our  toes  is  to  keep  her  in 
debt.  A fever  of  speculative  promotion  of  companies  has 
seized  upon  Tokio  from  time  to  time,  among  the  incor- 
porations being  the  Anglo-Japanese  Bank,  20,000,000 
formed  by  Okura,  thej.  Pierpont  Morgan  of  Japan;  Ojig- 
awa  Electric  Power,  13,000,000  yen;  the  Kyoto  Electric, 
6,000,000  yen,  and  so  on  to  a total  of  160,000,000  yen  in 
industrials.  The  banks’  names  as  a rule  are  tersely  busi- 
nesslike, merely  “ Sixty-fifth  Bank,”  “Eighteenth  Bank,” 
etc. 

On  exports  to  Manchuria,  the  subsidized  steamship 
lines,  which  so  far  are  in  private  control,  have  been  com- 
pelled by  the  government  to  reduce  rates  fifty  per  cent. 
During  the  first  year  after  the  war  the  government 
charged  on  its  Manchurian  Railway  half  rates  on  Jap- 
anese goods,  which  alone  came  duty  and  likin  free 
through  Tairen  (Dalny),  on  the  flimsy  pretext  that  Rus- 
sia, which  is  not  a manufacturing  nation  at  all,  had  no 
custom-houses  on  the  Manchurian  border.  This  duty 
preference  amounted  on  cotton  goods  to  four  yen  a bale. 
The  duties  and  freight  rates  on  the  South  Manchurian 
Railway  have  now  been  equalized  by  our  diplomatic  com- 
pulsion, but  government  loans  at  a nominal  rate,  Jap- 
anese police  throttling  the  competing  junk  trade  on  the 
Liao  Ho,  reduced  steamship  rates  on  Japanese  goods  car- 
ried in  Japanese  bottoms,  and  preference  car  supply  to 
Japanese  shippers  from  Tairen  up-country,  are  beating 
the  foreigner  just  as  effectually  as  ever  in  the  race  to  the 
Chinese  bazaars  of  Mukden,  which,  by  the  way,  are  port- 
able ones  manufactured  in  Japan.  In  Mukden  alone  there 
are  three  thousand  Japanese  traders.  At  least,  they  say 


412 


THE  CHINESE 


they  are,  though  they  carry  a “ Banzai  ” and  a dirk  under 
their  vests.  In  the  controversy  over  the  question  as  to 
how  the  foreigner  shall  be  treated  in  Manchuria,  Viscount 
Hayashi  has  represented  the  diplomatic  side  against  the 
exclusive  militarism  of  Marquis  Yamagata,  on  whose 
heart  is  written  a vow  against  the  Russ,  “ Back  to  Bai- 
kal,” and  doubtless  writing  against  others  of  us,  judg- 
ing from  what  preceded  the  retrocession  of  Newchwang 
in  December  1906.  China  looks  to  America  chiefly  to 
get  her  justice  in  her  own  province  of  Manchuria,  and  this 
must  be  settled  ere  many  years  pass.  The  Japanese  de- 
sired that  under  one  pretext  or  another  their  brands  or 
“ chops  ” should  have  two  years’  start  of  the  foreigner. 
Another  question  being  asked  is  what  connection  Sir 
Robert  Hart’s  withdrawal  from  the  Chinese  Imperial 
Customs  will  have  with  a Chinese  tariff  compulsorily  fa- 
voring Japan.  The  latter  feels  she  must  win  back  some- 
how in  the  next  ten  years  the  $600,000,000  she  spent  in 
the  war.  The  Chinese  indemnity  robbed  her  of  the  zeal 
for  that  chastening  experience  of  Pitt  and  Talleyrand  in 
paying  battalions  to  reap  glory  only.  Fifty  thousand 
Chinese  a year  are  leaving  Shan-tung  Province  for  Man- 
churia. The  Japanese  are  sending  among  them  free,  bat- 
tan  weaving  looms  and  teaching  their  use,  so  as  to  en- 
courage the  importation  of  Japanese  cotton  yarn.  Japan 
argues  that  if  India  with  three  million  hand  looms  can 
produce  two-thirds  of  her  needs  in  cotton  fabrics,  Man- 
churia is  not  too  poor  to  buy  Japanese  yarn  and  get  to 
work  in  clothing  herself  in  something  less  humorous  than 
sheep-skins. 

The  Bureau-bossing  malady  in  Japan’s  methods  has 
also  extended  to  finance,  the  government  assuming  the 
power  of  suspending  any  bank  on  the  pretext  of  driving 


JAPAN  A COMMERCIAL  EXAMPLE  413 

undesirable  persons  from  influence,  and  of  ejecting  from 
any  exchange  any  broker  or  listed  bond.  The  govern- 
ment controls  the  Yokohama  Specie  Bank  and  the  Bank 
of  Japan.  Before  the  war  the  Japanese  banks  did  every- 
thing possible  to  attract  foreign  money,  which  raised  not 
a little  suspicion.  I recall  that  the  branch  of  the  Yoko- 
hama Specie  Bank  in  Hong- Kong  paid  throughout  1903 
seven  per  cent,  to  depositors  against  five  and  one-half  per 
cent,  which  they  paid  in  Japan.  No  other  bank  in  Hong- 
Kong  paid  more  than  four  per  cent.  Loans  were  made  in 
Japan  at  as  high  a rate  as  nine  per  cent.  A Japanese  bank 
will  shortly  be  opened  in  Brazil  to  assist  Baron  Shibus- 
awa’s  new  Nippon  Kisen  Steamship  Company. 

China  is  far  behind  Japan  in  banking.  The  first  na- 
tional bank  is  barely  established,  and  its  working  has  not 
been  tested,  but  it  will  of  course  slowly  be  successful  and 
copied. 

The  war  table,  under  canvas,  on  a rough  field,  fur- 
nished withal  some  choice  crumbs,  one  being  the  $100,- 
000,000  Manchurian  Railway.  Another  was  the  exten- 
sion of  Japan’s  fishing  privileges  into  Siberian  waters. 
They  expect  to  take  $10,000,000  a year  in  salmon,  trout, 
cod  and  herring,  and  incidentally  to  enlarge  their  naval 
reserve  tremendously.  One  of  the  first  indications  of 
the  new  rights  was  the  creation  of  a fleet  of  fifteen  steam 
whalers,  with  a home  port  on  Ezo  Island.  A species  of 
menhadden  herring  is  also  pursued  for  oil  and  fertilizer. 
Watch  for  the  schools  is  kept  from  baskets  erected  on 
poles  on  shore.  The  nets  are  hauled  on  the  beach  and  the 
fish  thrown  into  bamboo  yards  until  they  can  be  tried  out 
in  the  brick  ovens.  About  sixty  per  cent,  of  the  oil  is 
drawn  out  by  the  fire  and  five  per  cent,  by  wooden  presses. 
The  oil  is  soldered  up  in  old  Standard  Oil  kerosene  cans. 


414 


THE  CHINESE 


The  residue  is  spread  in  the  sun  and  dried.  In  famine  it 
is  used  as  food,  and  in  good  times  it  is  powdered  up  for 
manure.  The  drying  process,  however,  costs  the  product 
the  stored  phosphorus.  The  government  is  expected  to 
step  in  at  any  time  and  stop  the  fishing,  as  the  menhadden 
attract  food  fishes  to  the  coast. 

The  production  of  crude  iodine  is  rapidly  increasing. 
Two  hundred  thousand  pounds  were  exported  last  year, 
averaging  one  dollar  and  eighty  cents  a pound.  Divers 
gather  it.  The  primitive  methods  of  burning  it  still  con- 
tinue. 

Cricket  bats,  tennis  rackets  and  nail  brushes  have  all 
won  the  market  in  Australia,  despite  the  prejudice  there 
against  the  Nipponese.  Osaka  is  producing  menthol 
crystals  from  distilled  dried  mint.  , The  plants  are  raised 
on  the  hills  around  Nagasaki. 

The  grow'th  of  the  press  can  be  judged  by  the  produc- 
tion of  paper.  In  1894,  the  year  of  the  Japan-China 
war,  the  Oji  and  Fuji  mills  produced  thirty  million 
pounds.  Last  year  they  produced  three  hundred  million 
pounds  and  had  to  move  their  factories  to  Ezo  (now 
Hokkaido)  Island  for  the  pulp  supply.  In  addition,  Ja- 
pan imported  twenty-five  million  pounds.  China  as  yet 
knows  little,  save  in  the  matter  of  forestry,  of  the  policy 
of  conservation  of  national  resources,  such  as  stocking 
fisheries,  etc.,  but  she  will  learn  from  Japan. 

A touch  of  the  sentimental  still  crops  out  in  Japanese 
business,  especially  in  some  of  the  decisions  in  equity. 
The  courts  decided  that  the  insurance  companies  need 
not  pay  in  full  fire  losses  which  were  occasioned  by  the 
Peace-News  rioters,  but  that  a compromise  payment 
should  be  made  on  the  understanding  that  it  was  “ money 
of  sympathy.” 


JAPAN  A COMMERCIAL  EXAMPLE  415 

As  it  was  to  be  expected,  now  that  war  has  ceased,  and 
one  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  soldiers  lie  about  idle,  the 
Japanese  courtezans  have  made  Port  Arthur  and  Tairen 
(Dalny)  like  the  hem  of  a Roman  triumph  with  the  moral 
flotsam  and  jetsam  strewn  along  the  course.  Their 
‘rickishas,  parasols,  gaudy  gowns  and  faces  have  brought 
unquestioned  color  to  what  before  was  a somber  enough 
scene.  The  Peking  Times  is  insistent  in  its  criticism,  and 
the  brave  Kirisii  Sekai  of  Tokio  has  bordered  on  lose  ma- 
jeste  in  its  worthy  strictures.  The  great  difficulty  is  in 
reaching  the  barons  and  wealthy  political  families  who 
have  long  patronized  the  geisha,  and  taken  many  as  sec- 
ondary wives  from  that  class.  From  a geisha  to  a cour- 
tezan is  more  of  a difference  in  age  than  a distinction  in 
morals.  You  may  ask  what  place  this  has  in  a business 
article.  Only  this,  that  Japan  makes  the  feature  a branch 
of  the  Government  Intelligence  Service  in  every  port  of 
the  East,  from  Hong-Kong’s  “ Ship  Street  ” to  Saigon’s 
and  Singapore’s  “ Yoshiwari  ” balconies  in  the  suburbs, 
and  every  one  of  these  Delilahs  knows  how  to  write,  and 
not  to  drink  too  much  saki  from  the  stone  bottles. 

Eastward  the  tide  of  Nippon  dares  to  take  its  way, 
and  as  illustrating  more  important  branches,  let  us  cite 
the  unexpected  line  of  saloon-keeping  in  Honolulu. 
Travelers  have  long  complained  of  the  high  price  of 
liquor  in  the  islands,  cocktails  being  twenty-five  cents  and 
beer  ten  cents  a glass.  Japanese  who  learned  English  on 
the  plantations  have  come  to  the  city  and  opened  bars 
where  cocktails  cost  ten  cents  and  beer  five  cents.  Again 
in  Hong-Kong  and  Canton  I found  printing  presses  and 
pianos  copied  from  American  models  by  the  Japanese, 
set  up  at  prices  which  neither  New  York  nor  London, 
with  their  lowest  “ export  prices,”  could  approach.  Now, 


4i6 


THE  CHINESE 


whether  it  be  bars  or  more  serious  endeavors,  Japan 
would  like  to  do  the  same  thing  on  both  sides  of  the 
Pacific,  and  mix  a potion  equally  sweet  and  extinguishing 
for  his  commercial  rival.  He  lost  his  temper  a little  at 
San  Francisco,  and  surprised  himself  more  than  he  did 
us;  but  he  never  loses  his  design. 

China,  with  her  economic,  able  and  exhaustless  labor, 
will  learn  some  of  the  apter  yellow  brother’s  ways.  She 
has  more  latent  power  and  our  assurance  is  that  she  has 
more  latent  character  in  the  approaching  business  compe- 
tition, first  for  the  Pacific,  and  later  for  the  world  field. 


XI 


THE  MIRROR  OF  THE  PAST 

China  alone  of  the  races  existing  to-day  traces  its  un- 
broken line  back  to  the  first  evidences  of  history.  She 
was  broad  in  her  culture  and  stable  in  her  institutions 
when  Egypt  was  a ruin.  The  Eg}’ptian  went  west  from 
Syria  and  in  due  time  collapsed  because  the  nation  was  an 
inverted  social  pyramid,  balanced  alone  on  aristocratic 
wealth  and  arrogance.  The  Aryan  went  south  to  India 
and  lost  his  mind  for  a season  in  vapid  philosophies 
brought  on  by  the  climate.  The  Chinese  went  northeast 
into  Turkestan;  scribbled  his  hieroglyphics  at  the  same 
time  that  Egypt  was  burying  hers;  left  his  hieroglyphics 
there;  rose,  said  like  Joseph  “let  us  build  granaries  in- 
stead of  monuments,”  and  betook  himself  through  the 
Kansu  gate  to  his  future  home,  from  whence  he  was  never 
to  look  back,  or  owe  to  any  one  a renewed  light  from  the 
lamp  of  knowledge,  for  he  kept  his  own  vessel  unbroken. 
Only  the  rear-guard  of  the  race  kept  in  any  touch  with 
the  Syrian  past.  There  are  only,  however,  etymological 
evidences.  The  Mongol  written  language  shows  its  re- 
lationship to  the  Hebrew  and  Syriac,  for  like  them  it  uses 
only  two  vowels,  i and  o.  The  other  vowels  must  be 
guessed.  Though  we  can  find  no  ruins  or  records  (largely 
through  Emperor  Tsin’s  mad  incendiarism)  dating  back 
to  the  pyramids  and  hieroglyphics,  China  has  incompara- 
bly the  longest  history  as  a cultured  nation,  which  is  prob- 
ability enough  that  the  race  went  back  farther  than  Egypt 

417 


4i8 


THE  CHINESE 


in  her  formative  years  of  thinner  culture  spent  in  Turkes- 
tan. The  Devanagari,  Uigur  and  Niu-chih  characters 
cut  on  the  Ku  Yung  gate  in  the  Great  Wall  are  not  an- 
cient, but  the  work  of  Mongol  sculptors  in  1345,  and  the 
inscriptions  on  the  rocks  near  Oorga  in  Gobi  Desert  were 
cut  in  1215  B,  C.  by  the  Mongol  men  of  Genghis  Khan. 

It  is  there  in  Turkestan,  among  the  relics  of  the  annual 
fair  camps  of  Mongols,  Shans,  Miaotszes  and  Lolos,  that 
archaeologists  must  look  for  the  China  which  parallels 
Rameses,  if  that  is  considered  worth  the  digging  for. 
The  numismatist  may  assist  in  these  scrapings  of  old  camp 
fires  and  mortuary  mounds.  There  exist  coins  which  were 
used  in  China  when  David  reigned  in  Jerusalem,  which 
are  exactly  the  same  as  the  common  cash  coin  of  to- 
day, with  the  exception  that  to-day  both  the  Mongolian 
and  the  Chinese  characters  repeat  the  expression,  “ current 
coin  of  the  realm,”  and  the  name  of  the  Emperor.  Then 
how  far  back  before  David  did  lost  coins  go?  But  if  we 
desire  to  make  moment  of  the  argument,  which  seems  im- 
material, we  can  easily  surpass  the  hieroglyphics  of  Egyp- 
tian history,  going  back  to  7000  B.  C.,  for  diggings  in 
Szechuen  Province  and  in  Eastern  Turkestan  have  fur- 
nished similar  stone  adzes  of  the  palaeolithic  age,  in  com- 
pany with  bones  of  extinct  mastodons.  Even  if  we  had 
hieroglyphics,  a more  popular  argument  of  the  age  of  a 
race  is  based  on  a comparative  study  of  the  formation  of 
the  social  organization,  and  literary  product.  If  it  took 
from  Moses  until  now,  about  four  thousand  years,  to 
reach  our  Western  social  and  mental  development,  and 
the  Chinese  had  an  equal  development,  lacking  construc- 
tive sciences,  in  723  B.  C.,  when  Confucius  wrote  and 
ruled,  we  can  easily  follow  the  race  back  to  times  contem- 
porary with  the  Pyramids. 


THE  MIRROR  OF  THE  PAST 


419 


This  lack  of  science,  remember,  was  a heroic  abnega- 
tion on  their  part,  for  every  principle  of  hydraulics,  trans- 
portation, navigation,  construction,  propulsion  and  refin- 
ing was  invented  by  them,  but  for  the  sake  of  the  existence 
of  the  many  (and  they  instructed  the  national  conscience 
to  see  that  there  would  be  many),  they  chose  the  rural  and 
trading  life  as  better  suited  to  their  mental  and  social 
peace  than  a manufacturing  organization.  They  blaz- 
oned on  their  scutcheon : “ To  live  well,  not  wealthy,” 

and  because  of  this  faith,  eternal  national  life  has  been 
given  them  alone,  of  which  their  absolutely  independent 
art  is  the  most  unique  manifestation.  Literature,  giving 
an  account  of  the  creation,  has  come  down  more  or  less 
correct  from  writers  contemporary  with  Moses,  which 
would  be  1491  B.  C.,  and  the  Chinese  Shu  King  history 
takes  dynastic  chronology  back  to  2200  B.  C.  in  Shensi 
alone.  Their  earliest  writings  discussing  creation  show 
philosophic  calm  and  create  no  mythology,  which  is  an- 
other proof  of  the  long  formed  and  steadied  nation. 
The  superstition  of  the  race  that  it  is  unlucky  to  repair 
anything  has  allowed  thousands  of  monuments  to  pass 
out  every  thousand  years. 

But  enough  of  the  past  is  within  reach  to  satisfy  the 
hungriest  antiquarian.  We  have  the  rubbings  of  the 
Mount  Hang  tablet  relating  the  inundation  in  tadpole 
characters,  which  tablet  went  to  pieces  in  1666  A.  D., 
after  a known  life  of  eight  hundred  years.  These  tad- 
pole characters  were  in  use  by  certain  priests  of  the  Hia 
kings  in  Shensi  Province  in  times  contemporary  with 
Noah.  In  the  Confucian  temple  at  Peking  are  the  hiero- 
glyphic stone  drums  relating  history  of  the  Chou  kings, 
and  which  is  more  than  remains  to-day  from  Solomon’s 
Temple,  which  was  executed  at  the  same  time.  Near 


420 


THE  CHINESE 


Ichang  on  the  Yangtze  River  stand  the  Yien-tung  (lit- 
erally smoke  towers),  which  were  erected  as  beacons  dur- 
ing this  same  dynasty.  These  towers  were  not  used  to 
burn  fire  at  night,  but  to  display  smoke  from  burning 
manure  by  day.  In  present  day  ideograms,  we  have  the 
poet  Han  Yu’s  song  of  the  creation  and  deluge,  which 
he  wrote  when  the  unpoetic  Assyrians  were  taking  to 
Nineveh  two  of  Thebes’  obelisks  on  a stone  boat,  over  a 
constantly  moving  bed  of  portable  stones,  which  they  had 
laid  over  the  sands. 

You  can  wander  through  Yunnan  Province  to-day 
among  the  downtrodden  Shan  tribes  and  observe  the  heel 
of  oppression  on  a dispossessed  race,  for  the  conquering 
Chinese  beat  them  down  here  from  the  Great  Plain  when 
the  Ethiopians  were  doing  the  same  thing  to  dying  Egypt, 
and  Syria  was  likewise  treating  shamed  Israel  under 
Ahaz. 

A blight  then  came  on  China  in  the  rise  of  Taoism 
with  its  depressing  theology,  at  the  time  when  far  away 
the  most  sonorous  voice  and  most  archangelic  poetry  that 
a human  being  ever  sounded,  were  hurling  lightnings 
among  the  shadows  of  men’s  thoughts,  in  the  words  of 
Isaiah. 

That  section  of  the  Grand  Canal  (literally  “grain- 
carrying ”)  north  of  the  Yangtze  River  to  the  Wei  River, 
one  hundred  and  fifty  miles,  was  being  dug  when  Nebu- 
chadnezzar was  cutting  his  Royal  Canal  at  Babylon  by 
gangs  of  captive  Jews,  whom  his  chariots  had  dragged 
from  desecrated  Zion. 

The  worlds.  West  and  East,  were  now  reaching  mo- 
mentous hours.  It  was  to  be  decided  whether  the  far 
West  was  to  be  a shambles,  or  if  white  mankind  could 
turn  in  peace  and  face  the  sun  of  knowledge.  Marathon 


CO^Riu»-.o>  gnOERMOOO  A UNOCRMOOO,  Y. 

The  Great  ^\'all  climbing  Liao  Hsi  (Iron  Mountains),  Xortli- 
Eastern  Pechili  Province. 


^'\  luilied  fort  on  the  old  wall  ol  t aiiton.  South  C hina.  Tartar 
airy  ])atrol  the  to]>  of  the  wall,  whieh  is  hnilt  of 
sandstone  and  hriek. 


'The  (freat  Wall  crossing  the  plain  between  the  sea  at  Shan-Hai- 
Kwan  and  the  Liao  Hsi  mountains,  Xortheastern 
Pechili  Province. 


eav- 


THE  MIRROR  OF  THE  PAST 


421 


decided  it  and  Athens  endowed  us  of  the  West  for  ever 
with  liberty  and  light.  On  that  same  day  China  reached 
the  iron  coast  of  Shan-tung  and  she,  too,  turned  her  face 
toward  the  sun  of  knowledge,  while  Confucius  wrote 
what  she  saw.  His  original  manuscripts  were  lost;  many 
succeeding  copies  were  lost,  but  the  succession  was  sure. 
His  words  were  good  and  mankind  was  sure  to  hold 
them  fast.  Antiquarians,  however,  can  handle  some- 
thing age-damp  of  this  period  in  the  Bamboo  Books,  dat- 
ing back  to  300  B.  C.,  found  in  a priest’s  tomb  in  Honan 
at  the  time  when  Zenobia  was  shining  in  the  West  with 
that  barbaric  beauty  which  has  dazzled  history,  which 
was  only  too  willing  to  record  such  things  for  a race 
that  liked  them. 

Events  now  cluster  in  our  little  western  world.  Philip 
of  Macedon  and  Demosthenes  exchanged  the  enginery  of 
javelin  and  anathema.  The  Colossus  of  Rhodes  was 
built  from  the  wreckage  of  Athenian  and  Egyptian  de- 
feat. Ptolemy  Philopater,  the  fratricide,  overran  Bible 
lands  and  sowed  salt  under  the  heels  of  his  spurning. 
Hannibal  challenged  the  Roman  Republic  and  Rome  re- 
taliated upon  the  walls  of  Carthage.  Destroyers  these 
were,  so  that  all  we  have  to-day  safe  from  their  hands 
is  the  little  Magna  Mater  temple  at  Rome  and  at  Edfu 
that  nearest  perfect  example  extant  of  an  Egyptian  tem- 
ple. Untutored  by  all  this,  not  wotting  of  it,  over  the 
misty  iron  Roof  of  the  World,  yea,  onward  a year’s  jour- 
ney to  the  Yellow  Sea,  we  find  the  Giant  Mason  of  all 
time  pacing  up  and  down  before  a clay  model  of  the 
known  earth;  pushing  his  engineers  aside  and  drawing 
his  trowel-sword  across  the  models  of  mountains  six 
thousand  feet  high,  and  decreeing  “ there  it  shall  go.” 
The  Giant  Mason  was  Tsin  Chi.  He  had  a palace  and 


422 


THE  CHINESE 


a throne  besides,  but  they  were  his  toys.  Work  was 
his  hobby,  and  that  hobby  the  Great  Wall  of  China,  the 
most  marvelous  monument  ever  erected  by  man,  and 
standing  for  your  wonder  and  mine  even  to-day  and 
for  ever.  He  was  a grim  humorist,  too;  when  vassal 
lords  of  rebellious  eye  and  mien  visited  him  in  his 
capital,  Hienyang,  he  was  wont  personally  to  conduct 
them  to  a little  object  lesson  in  the  back  yard:  toy  rep- 
licas of  the  palaces  of  rebellious  princes  whom  he  was 
compelled  to  annihilate.  He  told  these  same  vassals  he 
would  see  them  in  a year,  but  he  suddenly  dropped  in  on 
them  in  six  months  and  increased  the  tribute. 

He  was  always  up  and  down  his  kingdom  at  the  head 
of  armies,  and  he  built  great  roads,  for  we  do  not  learn 
that  any  successful  rebellion  got  under  way  before  his 
armies  arrived  back.  He  exacted  mercenaries,  just  as 
Carthage  was  then  doing  across  the  Roof  of  the  World. 
He  extended  the  Grand  Canal,  because  he  was  collecting 
grain  for  a work  which  should  surpass  even  the  superla- 
tives of  his  soothsayers.  He  was  here  an  adopter;  there 
an  originator.  Other  princes  had  raised  protecting  walls 
against  his  inroads.  He  took  them ; added  to  them ; com- 
bined them  into  a Wall  Trust.  He  was  the  first  great  In- 
corporator, Amalgamator,  Financier,  Despot  and  Trust 
King,  and  he  boasted  of  the  faults  and  virtues  of  them  all. 
As  he  grew  older,  he  believed  occasional  war  was  invented 
to  achieve  accumulated  peace.  He  believed  in  trade,  for 
he  didn’t  tax  his  highways.  He  taxed  luxuries,  aristo- 
crats, and  rebels.  He  has  for  all  time  given  the  name  of 
his  dynasty  to  his  country  because  of  this  monument,  and 
history  says  it  at  least  is  worthy. 

The  wall  is  fifteen  hundred  miles  long  and  has  the  ap- 
pearance of  a mighty  dragon  encircling  the  world,  and 


THE  MIRROR  OF  THE  PAST 


423 


hugging  it  deep  in  vale,  and  high  over  hill.  Some  bricks 
weigh  sixty  pounds.  At  the  base  it  is  twenty-five  feet 
across;  it  is  twenty-five  feet  high,  and  fifteen  feet  wide  at 
the  top.  Towers  every  mile  or  so  stand  twenty  feet  above 
the  wall,  and  they  are  often  built  as  redoubts  on  an  inde- 
pendent base.  At  places  the  wall  mounts  fifteen  hundred 
feet  in  the  sky.  Twenty  thousand  soldier  masons  labored 
at  it  for  ten  years.  Four  hundred  thousand  soldiers 
protected  the  twenty  thousand  trowel  men  from  the  Tur- 
kestan Mongols,  whose  “ cousinly  ” ambitions  and  traits 
Tsin  Chi  well  knew.  Twenty  thousand  more  soldiers 
were  in  the  Commissariat  Department,  which  farmed  as 
it  moved.  Thirty  thousand  more  men  were  in  the  Army 
Service  and  Transport  Corps,  which  had  a Potter’s  and  a 
Quarry  Department.  China  was  then  a nation  of  sixty 
millions.  Tsin  was  a peace-maker,  for  these  manceuvers 
kept  four  hundred  and  seventy  thousand  men  for  ten 
years  at  harmless  play,  and  away  from  their  brothers’ 
throats.  Indeed,  in  this  way  he  peopled  the  Mongol 
plains  and  made  possible  the  later  Tartar  invasions  and 
dynasties,  irony  though  such  a result  is,  and  he  as  well 
made  it  to  come  to  pass  that  Russia  should  be  largely 
Oriental  in  blood  and  taste. 

He  was  a sane  and  beneficent  ruler  until  he  finished 
parts  of  the  Wall.  He  was  a mighty  ruler  as  he  watched 
them  grow,  but  it  is  not  good  for  man  to  contemplate  too 
long  things  done.  He  went  mad  over  the  possibilities  of 
what  he  had  conceived  when  it  should  be  completed.  When 
the  Pharaohs  built  the  Pyramids,  they  immured  their 
hieroglyphic  records  in  them,  and  probably,  too,  went 
as  mad,  and  destroyed  everything  that  praised  a lesser 
or  a rival  being.  Tsin  Chi  decreed  history  should 
date  from  his  day,  and  popular  readers  may  agree  with 


424 


THE  CHINESE 


his  wishes,  for  perhaps  we  are  all  getting  tired  of  these 
antiquarian  chapters,  which  take  every  race  wading 
through  the  flood  to  times  contemporary  with  Luxor  and 
Babylon.  He  ordered  the  destruction  of  the  books  and 
records,  which  has  made  it  so  difficult  for  the  sinologue 
who  essays  personally  to  conduct  to  the  Ark.  Even  five 
hundred  priests,  most  famous  for  their  memorizing  of 
history  in  a land  where  memorizing  reached  its  perfec- 
tion, were  burned.  It  is  not  impossible  that  the  Great 
Wall  will  give  up,  as  the  years  go  by,  tablets  surrep- 
titiously and  ironically  put  there  by  rebels  to  this  insane 
edict,  and  thus  link  us  back  to  times  in  Turkestan  con- 
temporary with  Rameses,  which  would  only  be  from  the 
Shu  King  books,  contemporary  with  Noah,  back  two 
thousand  three  hundred  years.  The  Great  Wall  has  been 
copied  in  walls  about  every  city.  Enough  labor  has  been 
wasted  in  such  work  to  have  girded  the  land  with  perma- 
nent highways  and  lock-canals  which  would  be  floodless. 
Only  a land  which  has  teemed  with  millions  of  people, 
even  back  to  Noah’s  time,  could  have  stood  the  waste. 
Say  that  there  are  six  hundred  cities,  averaging  fifteen 
miles  around  each ; here  are  nine  thousand  more  miles  of 
wall.  It  was  largely  this  waste  of  labor,  values,  money 
and  mental  patience,  which  robbed  the  toil-driven  Chi- 
nese of  the  desire  to  carve  monuments,  strike  coins,  cut 
ideograms  into  stone,  metal  and  porcelain,  and  load  tombs 
with  archaeological  treasure,  so  that  here  Tsin  Chi  has 
made  us  poorer  because  of  his  mad  vanity-Trust.  There 
are  other  records  of  Tsin  Chi’s  work.  In  the  records  of 
the  far  western  province  of  Szechuen,  which  were  re- 
written as  the  old  copies  wore  out,  it  is  inscribed  that  the 
first  three  miles  of  the  present  wall  of  the  capital  Chingtoo 
were  erected  in  his  reign. 


THE  MIRROR  OF  THE  PAST 


425 


The  last  of  Egypt  and  mock-Egj'pt  had  been  seen,  and 
Manetho  in  270  B.  C.  composed  an  epitaph  upon  its  cul- 
ture and  arms  in  a history  written  in  the  Greek  language. 
China,  ever  renewing  itself  independently  of  all  outside 
influences,  was  even  more  refulgent  than  usual  in  social, 
martial  and  literary  glory.  When  Roman  Republicanism 
fought  for  its  franchise,  and  Sulla  offered  it  a halter  on 
the  way  from  Nola  to  Rome,  Szma  Tsien  was  writing  his 
great  history  of  one  hundred  and  thirty  chapters,  which 
flooded  twenty-two  centuries  with  the  light  of  returned 
day.  You  would  not  call  his  style  ponderous  like  Gib- 
bon’s, or  classically  pure  like  Macaulay’s,  but  vivacious 
like  Green’s  or  Herodotus’.  Largely  through  Szma 
Tsien’s  influence,  literature  was  established  for  all  time 
as  the  key  to  political  preferment,  and  the  classical  exam- 
inations became  universal. 

When  Christ  was  born,  the  Emperor  of  Peace  (Ping 
Ti)  of  the  Han  Dynasty  was  reigning  in  China.  For 
thousands  of  years  China  had  been  fully  civilized.  The 
rich  brine  and  natural  gas  wells  at  Tsz-liu-tsin  in  Sze- 
chuen,  which  are  still  worked,  are  mentioned  in  the  writ- 
ings of  the  Taoist  priest,  Lunghusan,  first  century.  Here, 
then,  is  a vast  enterprise,  producing  one  hundred  thousand 
tons  a year  of  salt,  with  a continuous  history  of  twenty 
centuries,  contributing  its  share  to  reveal  the  ancient  com- 
mercial stability  of  this  people.  No  other  country  in  the 
opening  century  of  the  Christian  era  had  such  a commer- 
cial development.  Religion  had  long  consisted  of  a litur- 
gy for  the  honoring  of  ancestors  and  the  practice  of  a de- 
cided moral  life  on  the  part  of  a man  as  individual  and 
citizen.  The  Christian  apostles,  and  the  Buddhists  of  In- 
dia, at  the  same  time  started  to  preach  their  gospels  to  the 
long- forgotten,  the  new-discovered  eastern  world,  which 


426 


THE  CHINESE 


now  reached  its  fullest  extension  by  absorbing  Cochin, 
and  St.  Thomas,  or  a disciple,  is  reported  to  have  reached 
Canton.  Buddhism  was  more  largely  equipped  and  was 
widely  successful  in  the  north  of  China.  Heathen  Rome 
was  then  erecting  the  Colosseum  for  Titus,  and  followed 
it  by  Trajan’s  superb  column.  They  liked  toys  more 
than  philosophies,  those  cringers  to  tyrants,  our  Latin 
forefathers.  The  cycles  rolled  and  ever  accumulated 
pagodas,  like  the  luxurious  Flower  Pagoda  yet  standing 
in  Canton,  as  well  as  balustrades,  and  monasteries,  until 
the  sweet  Nestorians  came  with  a faint  second  echo  of 
Christianity,  and  that  dear  melancholy  tablet,  cut  in  781, 
the  most  precious  stone  existing  in  all  the  world,  which 
lies  in  a temple  compound  in  Singan,  the  first  capital  of 
the  united  Chinese. 

Then  followed  the  Mohammedans,  matching  minaret 
against  pagoda,  until  the  arm  of  the  law  like  a wedge  has 
driven  the  remnant  of  their  rebellion  only  to  the  north 
and  south  of  the  kingdom.  Mohammedanism  challenged 
Buddhism  to  renewed  art,  and  the  latter  responded  with 
the  hexagonal  seven-storied  “ Tien  Fung  ” pagoda  at 
Ningpo,  which  is  still  standing.  But  grander  still,  the 
gem  of  Chinese  art  remaining  to-day,  she  fashioned  the 
falcon-like  curves  of  the  Loong  Wah  pagoda,  when  the 
best  that  Europe  was  doing  was  the  dreary  wooden  huts 
of  Charlemagne,  disconsolate  perhaps  after  losing  his 
Roland  at  Roncesvalles.  These  two  are  but  a salvage 
from  thousands  of  such  monuments  which  were  erected 
in  the  next  two  hundred  years.  When  Canute  the  Dane 
scourged  our  barbarian  English,  who  retreated  into  path- 
less forests  and  resigned  their  huts  to  his  firebrand;  when 
the  new  Russian  nation  on  the  one  hand  and  the  new 
Arab  nation  on  the  other,  rivals  for  the  term  “ World’s 


THE  MIRROR  OF  THE  PAST 


427 


Iconoclast,”  were  in  turn  trying  to  knock  down  the  walls 
of  Constantine’s  palace  at  Byzantium;  when  the  earlier 
Popes  drew  a longer  sword  than  a ready  prayer ; — sane, 
steady,  artistic  China  had  not  deviated  from  the  immemo- 
rial paths  of  magnificent  peace  and  culture,  as  sayeth  still 
that  grand  witness,  some  of  the  stone  piers  and  bulwarks 
of  the  “ Ten  Thousand  Ages  ” bridge  at  Fu-chau. 
There  was  nothing  but  truth  in  this  art,  and  the  national 
spirit  was  truth,  and  the  truth  was  freedom.  It  owed 
nothing  to  any  other  race.  It  came  before  them  and  lived 
after  them,  and  while  conceding  its  beauty  of  curve  and 
carving,  none  has  been  strong  enough  to  copy. 

It  mattered  little  if  a wilder  kindred  tribe  took  for  a 
season  the  mace  and  crown.  The  people  ruled  them- 
selves each  in  his  own  place  by  a conscience  that  brooked 
no  rebellion  or  impatience  or  lack  of  faith.  They  knew 
that  those  who  broke  in  roughly  among  them  for  honors, 
or  out  of  ignorant  intrusion  (for  they  accumulated  not 
wealth  save  for  their  need  from  day  to  day),  would  soon 
by  the  preponderating  example  of  virtue  be  as  obedient 
to  patriotism  as  themselves.  So  we  soon  find  the  Mon- 
gol Genghis  building  canals,  marble  summer  palaces  in 
the  Gobi  Desert  between  Kalgan  and  Urga,  and  those  un- 
opened grave  mounds  at  Kalgan ; and  his  grandson  Kub- 
lai  building  national  fleets.  But  Europe  thinks  more  of 
the  latter,  not  because  he  took  the  Master’s  course  at  the 
hands  of  his  subject-tutors,  but  because  he  entertained 
one  Polo,  a Venetian.  That  he  entertained  him  with 
breeding  which  was  a revelation  of  wonders,  let  the  same 
Polo  say  through  a thousand  noted  pages,  which  taught 
the  western  world  its  first  manners.  The  men  of  Gene- 
his  made  graves  as  follows:  The  body  was  taken  into 

the  open,  surrounded  with  dried  dung  (argol),  twigs 


428 


THE  CHINESE 


and  anything  burnable,  and  burned.  Then  each  one  of 
the  host  flung  a stone  and  relics  on  the  ashes.  As  time 
went  on,  sand  and  earth  made  a mound  of  this  cairn. 

Art  overcame  arms,  as  it  always  will  in  refined  China. 
The  encyclopedia  writers,  the  potters,  the  elder  brothers 
of  the  purple  people  themselves,  came  back  into  their  own 
in  the  famous,  delightful  Mings,  the  last  reigning  house 
of  the  pure  Chinese.  You  know  that  grandest  arch  in  the 
world,  so  wide,  airy  and  free,  at  the  entrance  to  the  four- 
mile  amphitheatre  twenty-five  miles  from  Peking,  and 
the  Herculean  statuary  of  twenty-two  figures  or  more, 
solemn  distances  apart  in  the  open  plain : warriors ; horses ; 
elephants;  tigers;  camels;  lions,  standing  and  recumbent 
in  pairs,  and  then  the  tombs  of  the  Mings,  with  acres  of 
silence  between  each.  Gorgeous  in  life  he  is  the  plainest 
in  death,  Yung  Loh,  who  thought  this  haven  of  the  soul 
all  out.  Marble  bridges,  green  and  yellow-tiled  pailos, 
painted  and  chiseled  inscriptions,  take  up  the  broken 
theme  of  woe  as  you  wander  on  from  hillock  to  hillock, 
and  disturb  alone  the  meadow  lark,  the  grasshopper  and 
your  memories.  Considering  it  is  eternal  China,  there  is 
no  antiquity  here,  but  for  us  Westerners  it  was  the  day  of 
Notre  Dame  and  the  first  part  of  the  Louvre,  and  these, 
too,  were  a gorgeous  curtain  across  the  passing  of  royalty. 

When  King  James’  translators  were  at  work  upon  our 
Protestant  Bible,  an  unfamiliar  band  of  Manchus  were 
setting  up  that  Temple  of  Literature  at  Mukden,  which 
you  can  enter  to-day,  and  which  the  Japanese  spat  upon, 
for  they  have  found  a different  key  to  life,  and  sixty- 
three  miles  east  on  the  Tsz-yun  Mountains  these  same 
Manchus  were  putting  in  order  another  tomb  for  one  now 
unpegging  his  felt  Bao  tent,  who  would  come  home  either 
as  a dead  shepherd,  or  as  the  conqueror  of  the  earth’s 


THE  MIRROR  OF  THE  PAST  429 

widest  throne,  to  pay  thanks  and  vows  to  his  father’s 
faithful  manes.  Comparatively  modern  as  is  the  begin- 
ning of  this  Tsin  (pure)  Dynasty  in  China,  it  is  still 
hoary  with  age  as  compared  with  the  oldest  thrones  of 
our  white  man’s  world.  The  exploits  of  arms,  and  by 
sea,  of  Richelieu  in  France  and  Cromwell  in  England, 
covered  a puny  space  as  compared  with  the  hosts  and  dis- 
tances with  which  their  contemporary.  Shun  Chi,  the  next 
Manchu  king,  had  to  deal  in  his  work  of  organization. 
It  was  the  following  sovereign,  Kang  He,  who  reigned, 
keeping  company  with  Louis  XIV.  all  along  fifty-four 
years  of  royal  road,  who  was  the  grandest  of  this  present 
Manchu  dynasty,  which  may  flutter  like  a candle  flame 
and  die  before  long.  Its  greatest  mind,  but  weakest  arm, 
was  the  beloved  Kwang  Su,  deceased  as  a martyr  only 
yesterday  by  sinister  causes,  and  on  whose  inspiring 
edicts  of  1897  the  present  blessed  constitutional  hopes  of 
China  are  based. 


THE  END 


index 


INDEX 


Aborigines,  217 

Agriculture,  60,  64,  73,  85,  108, 
121,  144,  152,  170,  188,  203,  221, 
227,  238,  240,  243,  309,  310,  316, 
319,  321,  337.  348,  381 
Ah  Fong,  84 

American  Business  Firms,  8,  64 
American  Interests  in  Orient,  27, 
49,  173,  187,  201,  207,  209,  240, 
278,  292,  293,  298,  303,  309,  334, 

335.  348,  388,  392,  409.  412 

Amoy,  328 

Ancestor  worship,  61,  67,  86,  99, 
103,  109,  III,  151,  153,  369,  372 
Animals,  51,  71,  144,  152,  320 
Antiquities,  417,  421 
Ants,  White,  329 
Arches,  127,  156,  285,  428 
Architecture,  31,  33,  35,  36,  67, 
75,  80,  84,  86,  1 12,  1 17,  127,  155, 
230,  247,  285 

Army,  Chinese,  97,  134,  161,  192, 
197,  203,  208,  240,  255,  312,  349, 
423 

Arms,  62,  78,  161,  207 
Army  Life,  Foreign,  10,  13,  16, 
18,  21,  27,  29,  30,  32,  48,  70, 
78,  80,  88,  183,  326,  343,  350 
Art,  248,  286,  317,  318,  334,  339, 

385 

Artisans,  116 

Australia,  50,  132,  209,  387 
Automobiles,  47 


Ball,  27 

Bamboo,  51,  73,  82,  240,  314,  315 
Bangkok,  332 

Banking,  6,  20,  26,  69,  125,  143, 

i6s.  174.  304.  306,  314.  41 1.  413 

Banners,  no 
Barber,  46,  70 
Bathing,  22,  153,  351 
Beds,  154 

Beggars,  66,  69,  176 
Belgians  in  China,  290 
Bethrothal,  38,  128,  135 
Birds,  50,  135,  308 
Birds’  Nests  Soup,  66 
Boat  Building,  114,  117 
Boat  Life,  12,  19,  30,  52,  63,  78, 
82,  136,  231,  237,  243,  315,  332, 
343.  355 
Bonze,  173 

Bowring,  Sir  John,  48,  95 
Boxers,  192,  195,  210,  291,  367 
Boycotts,  207,  214 
Boys,  135,  275 

Bredon,  Robert,  14,  60,  191,  224 
Bridges,  230,  290 
British  in  China,  209,  237,  278, 
293.  303.  321,  329,  349,  378,  389, 
409 

Bubonic  Plague,  24,  87,  326 
Buddhists,  23,  38,  99,  146,  175, 
245,  25s,  283,  308,  364,  372,  374. 
378,  425 

Buffaloes,  Water,  144,  228,  292, 

311 


433 


434 


INDEX 


Burning  of  Books,  424 
Business  Methods,  8,  26,  49,  136, 
139,  145.  158,  197,  201,  213,  25s, 
259,  284,  290,  312,  314,  323 
Butterfield  & Swire,  7,  8,  55,  390 

Camoens,  78,  87 
Canals,  64,  230,  420,  424 
Canton,  10,  63,  102,  124,  136,  164, 
193,  216,  224,  248,  274,  286,  290, 
31 1,  323,  36s 

Cantonese,  The,  58,  71,  189,  217, 
219 

Casa  de  Misericordia,  83 
Catholic  (Roman)  Missions,  367 
Cats,  152 

Cattle,  53,  144,  308,  309,  348 
Cement,  8 

Cemeteries,  52,  108,  iii,  202,  327, 
331,  350,  370 
Census,  no,  152 
Chairs,  18,  34,  39,  65,  68,  149,  153, 
17s,  216,  248,  342,  352 
Chang  Chih  Tung,  127,  191,  197, 
204,  293,  304,  312,  335,  395,  404 
Chifu,  345 

Ching,  Prince,  127,  196 
Ching-Too,  322,  424 
“ Chit  ” System,  26 
Chronology,  151,  417 
Chukiang  (Pearl  River),  49 
Chun,  Prince  (Regent),  191,  196, 
211 

Cicada,  38 

Clan-life,  168,  182,  228,  383 
Classical  Examinations,  99,  197, 
214 

Cliff  Dwellings,  157,  226 
Climate,  326,  330,  334.  34B  344 
Clocks,  158 

Clubs,  (social),  9,  13,  19,  26,  29, 
31,  68,  1 19 


' Coal,  7,  55,  15s,  176,  201,  238, 
241,  290,  291,  294,  395.  408 
Cobbler,  47,  56,  68,  69 
Colors,  149 
Comprador,  26 

Concessions  to  Foreign  Com- 
panies, 201 

Confucius,  102,  181,  203,  212,  262, 
269,  280,  363,  36s,  372,  374.  378, 
384,  418,  421 
Conjurer,  147 
Copper,  405 
Copyright,  397 
Crews,  Ship,  58,  389,  393 
Crime,  52,  57,  68,  77,  81,  99,  105, 
124,  158,  160,  166,  184,  336,  383 
Criticism  of  Anglo-Saxons  by 
Chinese,  278 

Cuisine,  69,  77,  107,  118,  120,  149, 

153.  319 

Curios,  62,  66 
Currency,  304 
Cursing,  68,  217 
Curzon,  Lord,  188 
Customs  Service,  Imperial,  60, 
123,  125,  191,  224,  256,  303,  305 

Danes  in  China,  301 
Death,  26,  61,  109,  358,  365,  382 
Dialects,  254,  256 
Diseases,  22,  24,  29,  31,  54,  61, 
105,  1 14,  150,  255,  294,  326,  329, 
332,  348 

Docks,  54,  303,  370,  387,  390,  394 
Dogs,  85,  107,  108,  228,  318 
Do-Shing,  72 

Dragon,  36,  82,  160,  202,  381 
Dress,  15,  20,  31,  59,  80,  149,  225, 
228,  282,  315,  378 

Economtcs,  89,  1 16,  267,  271,  273, 
278,  306,  313.  383.  410,  417.  419. 
427 


INDEX 


Education,  gg,  126,  177,  i8g,  igs, 
214,  221,  260,  386,  400 
Eliot,  Sir  John,  213 
Elliot,  Charles,  205 
Emigrants,  sg,  84,  log,  154,  i6g, 
igo,  ig4,  igg,  202,  218,  220,  221, 
281,  2gs,  320,  412 
Empress  Dowager,  Tse  Hsi,  133, 
igi,  ig2,  210 
English,  The,  gs 
Eunuchs,  165 
Eurasians,  21 

Examinations,  gg,  141,  212,  224, 
264,  42s 

Exclusion  Act  of  America,  202, 
281 

Extra-territoriality  Regimes,  163, 
igg,  200,  4og 
Ezo  Island,  3g8 

Famines,  112,  124,  157,  217,  23g, 
264,  379 
Fans,  ig 

Fertilizers,  124,  228,  3og,  323,  348 

Filipinos,  220 

Fire-crackers,  63,  318 

Fires,  60,  65,  154,  251 

Fish,  1 14,  1 18,  I4g,  152,  176,  308, 

413 

Floods,  73,  217,  23s,  238,  23g,  301, 
347,  357 

Flour,  26,  sg,  138,  312,  3g2 
Flowers,  38,  51,  g6,  i4g,  152,  275, 
334 

Foot-binding,  224 
Foreign  Powers,  Political  Rela- 
tions with,  62,  76,  87,  124,  186, 
189,  igg,  201,  216,  278,  2go,  335, 
2^7 

Formosa,  2og,  218,  341,  405 
Forts,  29,  33,  61,  76,  104,  318 
France  in  China,  76,  200,  201, 
204,  242,  294,  2g6,  360,  368,  4og 


435 

Fruit,  iig,  230,  241,  296,  308,  310 
Fu-chau,  240,  310 
Funeral,  175 
Fung-kwei,  70,  257 
Fungshui,  37,  108,  299,  308,  368, 
377,  395 

Furniture,  334,  399 
Furs,  44,  69 

Gambling,  i,  58,  59,  66,  82,  83, 

139,  141,  305 

Games,  135,  170,  301,  352,  359, 
362 

Gardens,  51,  67,  85,  86,  230, 

247 

Gas,  314,  425 
Gates,  104,  106 
Geisha,  340 

Genghis  Khan,  219,  241,  263,  386, 
418,  427 

Geology,  60,  203,  242,  287 
Geomancy,  37,  108,  299,  308,  368, 
377 

Germans  in  China,  13,  95,  107, 
1 19,  200,  204,  237,  247,  309,  323, 

389 

Ginger,  66 
Ginseng,  354 
Goa,  89 

Gobi  Desert,  190,  234,  300,  301, 
427 

God,  261,  385 

Goddess,  375,  382 

Gold,  321,  405,  406 

Golf  in  China,  2,  35,  50,  84 

Gong,  104 

Gordon,  “ Chinese,”  205 
Government,  168,  170,  264,  313, 

383,  427 

Governors,  Foreign,  28,  34 
Grand  Canal,  230,  420,  422 
Graves,  108,  227,  427 
Greek  Influence,  375 


436 


INDEX 


Guilds,  68,  1 17,  189,  210,  213 
Gymkanas,  2 

Hair,  106,  219 

Hakka  tribe,  19,  60,  62,  138,  151, 
174,  217,  224,  333,  358,  363 
Han  River,  239 
Hang-chow,  379 

Han-kau,  132,  142,  239,  245,  290, 
324.  390,  395.  406 
Han-yang,  291,  318 
Happy  Valley,  2,  331 
Hara-kiri,  134 
Harbor  Dues  in  Orient,  5 
Hart,  Sir  Robt.,  60,  125,  168,  224, 
256,  302,  366,  412 
Heat,  2,  21,  28,  30,  58,  63,  77,  80, 
157,  229,  343,  349 
Hieroglyphics,  417 
Hindoos,  16,  18,  41,  42,  43,  57,  187 
Hoang-ho  (river),  235,  237,  241, 
290,  301 

Hoare,  Bishop  J.  C.,  361 
Hong,  A,  27 

Hong-Kong’s  Architecture,  31 
Hong-Kong’s  Clubs,  9 
Hong-Kong’s  Botanic  Gardens, 

51 

Hong-Kong’s  Fortifications,  29 
Hong-Kong’s  Harbor,  5,  60,  63, 
137,  144,  174,  309,  342,  357 
Hong-Kong,  in  general,  207,  217, 
221,  264,  274,  292,  302,  305,  308, 
309,  31 1,  326,  338,  342,  369 

Hong-Kong’s  Race  Week,  i 
Hong-Kong  & Shanghai  Bank, 
6,  33,  221,  293 
Horses,  i,  21,  31,  204 
Hospitals,  61,  344 
Hotels,  10,  31,  68,  76,  155,  284 
Houses,  69,  80,  84,  107,  129,  133, 
151.  154,  157,  226,  318,  330,  334, 

350 


Humor,  47,  no,  162,  173,  319, 
339,  380,  384 

Hung  Siu  Tsuen,  102,  150 
Hygiene,  25,  34,  329,  341 
Hypnotism,  148 

Ice,  121 

Idols,  249,  380 

Ignez  de  Castro,  94 

Incense,  no,  366 

Indemnities,  Chinese,  205,  293, 

341 

India’s  Railways,  300 
Industrial  Progress,  197,  201, 
238,  280,  290,  301,  303,  304,  308, 
31 1,  313,  316,  321,  325,  390,  395, 
398,  415,  419 
Infanticide  112 

Insects,  38,  138,  139,  ISS,  226, 
277,  329,  344,  351,  354 
Iron,  290,  395,  406 
Irrigation,  238,  295 

Jackson,  Sir  Thomas,  6 
Jail,  38 

Japanese,  17,  49,  100,  134,  187, 
188,  191,  198,  200,  201,  203,  206, 
208,  216,  220,  244,  261,  282,  290, 

299,  303,  308,  313,  316,  326,  329, 
360,  373,  387,  428 
Jardine,  Matheson  & Co.,  7,  390 
Jewelry,  17,  44,  47,  66,  286,  287 
Jews  in  China,  219,  385,  420 
Jinrickisha,  28,  302 
Joseph,  417 
Joss  House,  36 
Junk  Bay,  23,  40 
Juries,  5,  99,  164,  189 

Kaifong,  219,  238,  240,  385 
Kaikhta,  300 
Kalgan,  294 

Kang  Yu  Wei,  188,  191,  193 


INDEX 


437 


Kansu,  417 

Keppell,  Admiral,  8,  35 
Kiao-chou,  200 
King  Teh  Ching,  250 
Kites,  135 

Korea,  171,  209,  274,  406 
Kowloon,  35,  41,  6i,  200,  217,  319 
Kublai  Khan,  199,  206,  244,  389, 

427 

Kwangtung  Province,  51,  149, 
ISO,  151,  190,  206,  207,  217,  219, 
225,  227,  274,  306 
Kwang  Su,  Emperor,  100,  192, 
193,  196,  210,  429 

Lacquer,  53,  113,  158,  287 
Lakes,  232,  234 
Lamps,  151,  153 

Land,  7,  121,  168,  228,  299,  304, 
312 

Language,  254,  259 
Lanterns,  12,  36,  69,  70,  77,  no, 
141,  238,  249,  283,  379,  381 
Launches,  29 
Law,  Foreign,  4,  20,  33 
Law,  Native,  53.  98,  124,  125, 
148,  160,  163,  16s,  200,  315 
Lepers,  332 
Letters,  159,  177,  222 
Liang  Chih  Choa,  195 
Lighthouses,  30,  60,  125 
Li  Hung  Chang,  52,  123,  165, 
192,  278 
Likin  Tax,  303 

Ling  Chih  Punishment,  161,  164 
Lintin  Island,  64 
Lin  Tseh  Su,  341 
Liquor  in  China,  ii,  22,  26,  27, 
29,  76,  80,  85,  1 19,  121,  141,  161, 
172 

Literature,  Foreign,  48,  79,  82, 

88,  91,  370 


Literature,  Native,  102,  127,  197, 
216,  258,  260,  264,  276,  375,  380 
Locks,  158,  174 
Loess,  62,  231,  23s,  292 
Longfellow,  250,  280 
Loti  Tax,  313,  320 
Lottery,  18 
Lukong,  20 
Lusiad,  79,  89,  92 

Macao,  75,  79,  90,  108,  115,  200, 
207,  216,  219,  24s,  302,  318,  350, 
370 

Mafoos,  I 

Manchus,  66,  98,  188,  192,  194, 
196,  198,  200,  212,  250,  262,  400, 
428 

Manchuria,  190,  206,  209,  262, 
284,  300,  310,  321,  407,  41 1 
Manila,  87,  151,  186,  220,  302, 
348,  356,  362,  387 
Manners,  68,  125,  139,  149,  155, 

159,  427 

Marco  Polo,  83,  230,  427 
Marriage,  128,  218,  313,  376,  419 
Matting,  73,  395 
Measures,  143 

Medical  Matters,  69,  loi,  104, 
136,  310,  326,  348,  352 
Meteorites,  384 

Metropolitan  Museum  of  Art, 
New  York  City,  Chinese  Spec- 
imens in,  246,  251,  287,  372 
Military  Life  in  China,  Foreign, 
10,  13,  16,  18,  21,  27,  29,  30,  32, 
42,  48,  70,  78,  80,  88,  183,  326, 
343.  350 

Military  Life,  Chinese,  97,  123, 
134,  192,  197,  203,  208,  240,  244, 
25s,  312,  349,  423 
Milk,  53 

Mines,  289,  291,  294,  296,  313, 
320,  395,  404 


43^ 


INDEX 


Ming  DjTiasty,  428 
Ming  Tombs,  285,  428 
Miracles,  375 
ilirs  Bay,  2,  237 
Misericordia,  Casa  de,  83 
Missions,  15.  32,  65,  80,  81,  91, 
103,  127,  200,  263,  319,  361, 
367,  381,  425 

Mitsui  Company,  54,  391,  394,  410 
Mohammedans,  41,  66,  iii,  169, 
219,  378,  386,  426 
Money,  304 

Mongols,  235,  240,  262,  304,  374. 

417.  423 

Monuments,  113,  127,  156,  419, 
426 

Morley,  John,  338 
Morrison,  Robt,  82,  361,  370 
Mounuins,  31,  32,  34,  37,  45,  60, 
73  225,  226,  244,  308,  342,  347, 
365 

Mukden,  220,  411 

Music,  13  27,  41,  47,  80,  150,  329 

Musk,  320 

Names,  253  273  373 
Nanking,  19,  102,  153  245,  286, 
28S,  332 

Natural  History  Museum,  New 
York  City,  Meteorite  in,  384 
Na>-ies,  Chinese,  224,  244,  393 
Na\-ies,  Foreign,  28,  49,  54,  70. 

78,  123.  207,  209,  355.  358,  389 
Nestorian  Tablet,  371 
Nestorians,  370,  386,  426 
New  China  Parties,  53,  97,  187, 
193.  207,  293 
Newchwang.  323 
Newpapers,  Foreign,  48 
Newspapers,  Chinese,  113  165, 
175.  199.  214,  260,  264.  307,  334 
New  Year  Celebration,  98,  139 
Ningpo,  226,  274,  426 


Numerals,  142 
Nuns,  375 

Oaths,  162 

Oil,  151,  304,  309.  323  391 

Opium,  77,  87,  99,  122,  124,  133 
172  206.  213  281,  316,  334 
Osaka,  388,  404 

Pagodas,  63  245,  426 
Painting.  286,  288,  316 
Paos,  113  163  173  199,  214,  260, 
264,  307,  334 

Paper-making,  240,  313  414 
Paris-mutuels  Betting,  i 
Parsees,  i,  14,  17,  18,  33  174 
Patents,  396 
Patriotism,  New,  53 
Pawn-shops,  65,  210,  214,  226, 
22S,  307 

Pearl  River  (Chukiang),  49 
Peking,  Siege  of,  42,  193  201 
Peking  Gazette,  264 
Peking,  in  general,  70,  106,  161, 
189,  204,  219,  235,  243  276,  290, 
298 

Philippines,  220 

Philosophy,  267,  280,  302,  331, 
374 

Physicians,  69,  332,  352 
Pidgin-Engiish,  258 
Pigs,  146,  185,  376 
Pipes,  151,  339 

Pirates,  17,  49.  64,  63  73  78, 
106,  m,  122,  123  123  161,  207, 
229 

Police,  40,  42,  57.  77.  86,  104.  140, 
218,  324 

Political  Progress,  60,  61,  186, 
191,  192,  198,  202,  203  206,  208, 
212,  214,  224,  259.  264,  278,  373 
429 

Poor,  The,  39.  74,  1L2,  113  124, 


INDEX 


134,  145,  166,  167,  184,  228,  253, 
264,  279,  303,  306,  309,  313,  314. 
316,  318,  319.  324.  329.  332,  336, 
375 

Portuguese.  The,  75,  79,  84,  88, 
92,  200,  216,  219,  242,  249,  318, 
350 

Postal  Service,  159,  301 
Pottery,  60,  246,  249,  422 
Processions,  81,  139,  214,  215 
Protestantism  in  China,  82,  103, 
263,  361,  369,  381 
Public  Utilities,  322,  323,  324 
Punishments,  161,  163,  315 

Races,  Horse,  i,  106 
Railways  in  China,  6,  7,  27,  134, 
143,  190,  197.  203,  207,  213,  228, 
239.  254,  290,  296,  300,  302,  307, 
324.  395,  399,  402,  408,  413 
Railways  in  India,  300 
Railways  in  Japan,  402 
Railways  in  Siberia,  403 
Rain,  S3,  346 

Rates  of  Transportation,  73,  298, 

389 

Rats,  24,  106 
Reclamation,  55 
Red  River,  Tonquin,  351 
Reforestation,  60,  116,  233,  236, 
239,  316,  399,  414 
Religions,  41,  43,  58,  III,  138, 
163,  173,  244.  247,  358,  363,  379 
Regent,  Prince  Chun,  191,  196, 
211 

Representation,  Political,  165,  187 
Reptiles,  330 

Rice,  121,  227,  3 1 1,  337,  347,  349 

Richtofen,  201,  291,  297 

’Rickisha,  28,  302 

Riots,  42,  216,  367 

Rivers,  71,  114,  233,  235,  239,  30i 


439 

Roads,  Country,  62,  76,  84,  156, 
171,  322 

Romans,  244,  381,  425,  426 
Roosevelt,  Theodore,  193,  293, 
380 

Ruins,  80,  231,  357 
Russell  & Company,  8 
Russians,  132,  187,  201,  204,  219, 
300,  321,  403,  409,  423,  426 

Saigon,  332 

“ Sainam  ”,  5,  6,  17,  71,  124 
Salt,  122,  304,  314,  405 
Schools,  259,  260 
Scotch  in  China,  27,  48,  54,  173 
Sculpture,  288 

Secret  Societies,  15,  97,  162,  191, 
206,  339 

Servants,  Chinese,  28,  45,  159, 
177,  182,  302 

Seward,  Secretary  Wm.  H.,  221 
Shameen  Island,  65,  248 
Shanghai,  134,  200,  225,  235,  274, 
290,  298,  332 

Shansi  Province,  241,  274,  291, 

297,  367 

Shan-tung  Province,  220,  235, 
274,  295,  412,  421 
Shensi  Province,  201,  228,  274, 
304,  314,  379,  419 
Shipbuilding,  54,  303,  391 
Shipping,  s,  58,  59,  87,  109,  I45, 
149,  251,  298,  387 
Shoes,  56 

Shops,  180,  182,  283,  287,  354 
Shorthand,  259 
Shroffs,  261,  283 
Shum,  Viceroy,  124,  191 
Siberian  Railway,  403 
Siesta  System,  30 
Sikiang  (West  River),  17,  23, 
52,  71,  ns,  123,  245,  347 


440 


INDEX 


Silk,  56,  107,  241,  316,  317 
Society,  Foreign,  2,  27,  182,  183 
Soochow,  231,  245 
Soy,  319 
Spectacles,  159 

Sport,  I,  8,  21,  44,  134,  145,  229, 

352,  359 

St.  Andrew’s  Ball,  27 
St.  Thomas,  425 
Stanley,  350 
Statues,  32 

Steamboats,  30,  75,  iii,  122,  136, 
221,  243,  335 
Stone  Battles,  170 
Story-tellers,  69 
Stoves,  154 

Street  Life,  68,  283,  302 
Students,  100,  loi,  215,  399 
Subsidy  of  Shipping,  389,  391, 
392,  394,  41 1 
Suffrage,  100 
Sugar  production,  7 
Suicide,  135 
Sun  Yat  Sen,  194 
Superstitions,  80,  106,  136,  142, 
150,  244,  247,  345,  363,  377,  382, 

384 

Szechuen  Province,  149,  151, 

217,  219,  231,  274,  304,  314,  322, 

334,  365,  418 

Tablets,  iii,  262 

Taeping  Rebellion,  150,  161,  193, 

218,  245,  367,  379 

Taoists,  18,  44,  53,  364,  368,  377, 
378,  420 
Tailors,  56 
Tattooer,  56 

Taxes,  63,  68,  166,  168,  184,  206, 
216,  224,  303,  312,  313,  338,  401 
Tea,  1 19,  129,  55,  290,  323 
Teak,  10,  40,  248 


Telegraphs,  256,  259,  301 
Telephones,  48 

Temples,  36,  65,  66,  71,  72,  113, 
240,  247,  252,  288,  308,  358,  365, 
380 

Theaters,  119,  281 
Thibit,  132,  147,  186,  241,  254, 
263,  274,  312,  321,  365 
Tientsin,  368 
Tin,  320 
Tobacco,  15 1 
Tones  in  Speech,  258 
Treaties,  303 

Treaty  Ports,  Foreign  Life  at, 

I,  9 

Trees,  25,  33,  51,  57,  96,  133,  226, 
232,  236,  239,  309,  343,  377,  399 
Tse  Hsi,  Empress  Dowager,  133, 
191,  192,  210 

Tsin  Chi,  Emperor,  417,  421 
Turkestan,  417,  418,  424 
Typhoons,  31,  73,  136,  355 

Unions,  Trades,  117,  145,  317 
U.  S.  Marine  Hospital  Service 
in  China,  348 

Utilities,  Public,  322,  323,  324 

Vasco  da  Gama,  94,  242,  248,  331 
Vermilion,  288 
Village  Life,  228 

Wages,  321,  389,  394,  401 
Wai  Wu  Pu,  180,  294,  337 
Wall,  Great,  65,  105,  204,  230, 
251,  297,  421 

Walls,  61,  76,  85,  86,  104,  129, 
223,  285,  318,  424 
Warehouse,  149 
Washing,  52 

Water  for  Drinking,  22,  24,  130. 
218,  232,  323 


INDEX 


441 


Water  Life,  12,  19,  23,  25,  29,  30, 
52.  63,  73,  82,  96,  134,  136,  148, 
202,  22s,  230,  231,  233,  243,  332 
Weights,  144,  403 
Wei-hai-wei,  321,  345 
Whompoa,  6,  27,  54,  64,  207,  292, 

324 

White  Cloud  Hills,  109 
Women,  20,  27,  45,  60,  66,  no, 
120, 126, 128, 135. 137. 146,  ISS. 
174,  197,  200,  223,  224,  227,  230, 
249,  261,  275,  282,  302,  316,  324, 
374.  41S 

Wong  Nei  Chong  Valley,  2,  331 
Wood-carving,  248 


Wool,  317 
Woosung,  134,  23s 
Writing,  136,  254,  259 
Wu  Ting  Fang,  60,  160,  195 

Yamens,  37,  68 

Yangtze  River,  52,  204,  230, 
233.  237.  274,  290,  293,  301,  337, 
391 

Yellow  River,  235,  237,  241,  290, 
301 

Yuan  Shih  Kai,  191,  192,  201, 
224,  275 

Yunnan,  252,  274,  294,  301,  320, 
327,  334,  337,  379 


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